By LAMECH JOHNSON
Tribune Staff Reporter
ljohnson@tribuemedia.net
A MAN awaiting retrial for murder was sentenced to 10 years in prison yesterday for an armed robbery reportedly connected to the country’s 16th murder in 2012.
Ramond Nottage faced up to life imprisonment when he appeared before Justice Roy Jones to be sentenced for stealing the rim of a tyre from Akyto Samuel Smith on February 15, 2012.
Smith’s body was found by police, bound and gagged in the trunk of a car on Sir Milo Butler Highway.
There was a hung jury on the murder charge. However, he was convicted of armed robbery. His brother, 27-year-old Rashad Nottage, was acquitted of the armed robbery and murder charges by the judge’s direction to the jury days before the case ended.
In yesterday’s proceedings, Ramond’s lawyer, Murrio Ducille, said there were a number of extreme mitigating factors in his client’s case, supported by the probation report, that would support the judge’s discretion to suspend Ramond’s sentence.
The lawyer argued that not only was his client brought up in a supportive nuclear family structure, but Nottage was also gainfully employed before his imprisonment.
Mr Ducille further highlighted that the 24-year-old had no prior brushes with the law and also had not broken any prison rules during his time before trial and since conviction.
The lawyer added that his client’s lack of remorse was consistent with a person maintaining their innocence.
“Give him a chance to let him determine his future because no one else can determine that for him,” Mr Ducille said, adding that Nottage “has understood that Fox Hill prison is no place for him, or anybody.”
Justice Jones, after taking a few moments to consider the mitigation plea, said that Nottage had not shown any remorse “at all.”
The judge was of the view that no other punishment than a custodial sentence would suffice “having regard to the seriousness of the offence and the need for deterrence against these types of crimes in the community.”
The judge acknowledged the convict’s age and hoped that he would use his time in prison to reflect on his life. He sentenced him to 10 years in jail.
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