Tomorrow, the Guyana Court of Appeal will deliver its ruling on whether it will reduce a 70-year sentence imposed on Rajesh Guyadeen, who had been convicted of the 2003 murder of Nandram Manohar, or whether it will altogether set aside the conviction/and or order a new trial.
Guyadeen called ‘Bricksman’ had been convicted by a jury back in 2018 for fatally stabbing Manohar after an altercation at a wedding house at Unity, East Coast Demerara, on the night of May 4th, 2003.
Justice Navindra Singh who presided over the trial, had sentenced Guyadeen to 70 years behind bars.
Declaring that he showed no remorse, Justice Singh had said that from the evidence presented at trial, he found Guyadeen’s actions to have been premeditated.
“You lay in wait and stabbed the deceased,” the Judge had told the convict.
Justice Singh commenced Guyadeen’s sentence at a base of 60 years and added an additional 10 years for what he said was the premeditated nature of the killing, which he went on to note was an aggravating factor, coupled with the convict’s lack of remorse.
Guyadeen would later file an appeal in which he challenged both his conviction and sentence.
He argued that Justice Singh had committed a number of errors which led to the jury rendering an unsafe verdict.
He had argued in his notice of appeal that the Judge had allowed evidence prejudicial to him, to be admitted at the trial and had misdirected the jury in his summation of the case.
It is against this background that he asks the appellate court to overturn his conviction.
Additionally, he argues that his sentence was too harsh, manifestly excessive and not in keeping with sentencing guidelines.
The appeal which was presided over by acting Chancellor Yonette Cummings-Edwards and Justices of Appeal Dawn Gregory and Rishi Persaud will come up at 2:00 this afternoon for ruling.
The State’s case had been that Guyadeen fatally stabbed Nandram in the abdomen after an earlier altercation at a wedding house on the night of May 4th, 2003.
The prosecution had argued, among other things, that after committing the offence, the convict fled to neighbouring Suriname and was only arrested and charged after he returned some 11 years later.
