The Tribune

By LEANDRA ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Court of Appeal yesterday adjourned the substantive hearing of the appeals of two women convicted of murdering teenage mother Breanna Mackey four years ago.

Zaria Burrows and Dervinique Edwards were sentenced 28 years in prison last June after they were found guilty of the 19-year-old’s death in January 2018.

Their sentences were ordered to run from the date they were placed on remand.

However, The Tribune understands the women plan to challenge the convictions and sentences they received.

An official hearing on the matter was scheduled to be heard before the appellate panel of justices yesterday but was adjourned to March after Burrows’ attorney, Jairam Mangra, told the court he was not feeling well.

Meanwhile, Edwards’ attorney, Marianne Cadet, said while she was in a position to proceed with her client’s appeal, she would prefer for all of the matters to be heard at the same time.

In view of this, the court adjourned the matter to March 10.

Mackey’s death came at the hands of girls who were supposed to be her friends because they wanted her to pay for a broken $80 Huawei cell phone that belonged to one of them.

Police said shortly before 6pm that day, they were contacted about reports that a woman was stabbed in the Key West Street area off Cordeaux Avenue. Police officers were dispatched to investigate.

Upon their arrival, a woman, identified as the victim’s sister, Latisha Woodside, directed officers to a brown and white apartment complex on the eastern side of Key West Street.

On the porch, just in front of door number nine, officers discovered Mackey, semi-conscious, lying face down and suffering from four stab wounds to her upper back and two stab wounds to her right arm.

The mother-of-one had turned 19 the day before she was taken to Princess Margaret Hospital where she died.

Burrows and Edwards were last of the six women who were convicted and subsequently sentenced in connection with Mackey’s murder that night.