Man with machine gun jailed for two years

A magistrate exceeded her jurisdiction when she jailed a man for 36 months and 28 months to run concurrently on summary convictions on charges of possession of arms and ammunition respectively. The maximum sentence is two years.

It was Justice of Appeal Anthony Lucky who pointed out the magistrate’s error in the Court of Appeal on Friday, and had to vary the sentence accordingly. Attorney Cecil Pope was at the time protesting to the Court of Appeal that the three-year sentence of Garfield Charles for possession of arms and ammunition was too severe when Justice Lucky made the observation to Pope. The judge further explained that had Charles been convicted indictably, then the maximum sentence would have been five years. Pope complained about severity of sentence. Noting that Charles had pleaded guilty and that this was his first conviction, Pope wanted a lighter sentence. But  Justice  Lucky remonstrated: “For a sub-machine gun and 70 rounds of ammunition! You are talking about a gun that is capable of rapid  fire.”

Justice Lucky (President), sitting together with Justice Stanley John, reminded Pope that earlier in the week Chief Justice Sat  Sharma had expressed concern about the prevalence of gun related offences and called on magistrates not to hesitate to jail first offenders. Senior State prosecutor Trevor Ward agreed with the Court that the magistrate had exceeded her jurisdiction in sentencing. The Court then dismissed the appeal but varied the sentence to the correct prison term of two years  and ordered that it start from Friday. The facts of the case are that on August 25, 2002, at about 3.30 pm, PC Shawn Hoyte and other policemen were on mobile patrol when they stopped a vehicle Charles was in. Hoyte told Charles that he had information that he was in possession of arms and ammunition, but Charles denied the accusation.  On searching Charles, the police found a sub-machine gun and 70 rounds of ammunition. Charles was taken to the Morvant Police Station and charged. He pleaded guilty on August 28, 2002 and was sentenced.