The Tribune

By LAMECH JOHNSON

Tribune Staff Reporter 

ljohnson@tribunemedia.net

JUSTICE Roy Jones will decide next week whether a man convicted of a double murder will be sentenced to death, life imprisonment or a fixed jail term.

The judge received reports from a probation officer and a psychiatrist yesterday while also hearing submissions from defence and Crown counsel concerning the sentencing of George Williams for the April 23, 2008 murders of Andy Weekes and Terrel Mingo.

Weekes, 32, and Mingo, 29, were both shot in the head behind a house on Adventurer’s Way. Weekes died at the scene and Mingo died the following day.

Prosecutor Neil Braithwaite submitted to the court that the death penalty was a fitting punishment in this case because Weekes was simply a witness in the wrong place and time when Williams and Mingo were in a dispute over proceeds from crime.

The prosecutor submitted that murdering a witness counted in the category of “worst of the worst” set out by Parliament’s amendment to the death penalty laws in 2011.

While highlighting that Williams had shown no remorse for the crimes, the prosecutor also noted that Williams, according to the probation report, had a number of infractions while on remand in prison.

The prosecutor said that given this information and the fact that he has a previous conviction for manslaughter, his prospects for reform were slim to none.

In response, Williams’ lawyer Jiaram Mangra, argued that a determinant sentence was appropriate in his client’s case.

While acknowledging that the law now allows for the court to consider the death penalty in certain circumstances of murder, he submitted the law for that circumstance only applied to witnesses in pending cases before the court.

He also noted that while his client was not unblemished, the psychiatric evaluation did not rule out any prospects for Williams’ reform.

Justice Jones said he would decide on a sentence in six days time on July 2.