The Tribune

By FARRAH JOHNSON

Tribune Staff Reporter

fjohnson@tribunemedia.net

THE Court of Appeal yesterday refused the extension of time application of a man attempting to appeal the sentence he received for breaking into a humanitarian aid organisation in Abaco to steal building supplies.

In January, Craig Gray and Justin Hanna were charged with unlawfully entering Samaritan’s Purse and removing construction material without permission. The pair were later convicted of shop breaking and stealing and Gray, who had two previous convictions, was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment, while his co-accused, with no criminal record, was remanded to prison for two years.

A month later, he filed a notice of appeal and application for an extension of time appealing his sentence on the grounds that the magistrate took “extraneous matters” into consideration. He further argued that the magistrate failed to consider sentencing principle guidelines of parity and proportionality.

Yesterday, Sir Michael Barnett, Roy Jones, and Milton Evans refused Gray’s application for an extension of time after ruling that there was “no dispute” concerning the fact that he had previous convictions while his co-accused had none.

“This was clearly not a case where it could reasonably be said that all things were equal,” Justice Evans said in the panel’s judgement.

“In determining the sentence for the intended appellant, the magistrate took into consideration his previous convictions and in our view, she was entitled to do so. This led her to impose a different sentence on him from that which was given to his co-accused.”

Justice Evans also noted an error of principle must occur for the panel to revise a sentence.

He said: “The intended appellant was not able to satisfy us that the learned magistrate had taken into consideration matters which she ought not to have done. We could find no error in the exercise of the magistrate’s discretion, nor could we say that the results were plainly wrong. It was for these reasons that we found that the proposed grounds of appeal had no prospects of success and the application was refused.”