Man sentenced to 78-years for killing wife

Criminal-JusticeGeorgetown: After being sentenced to 78 years’ imprisonment when an Assize jury found him guilty of murdering his 20-year-old reputed wife, Kevin Verwayne , a 25-year-old labourer of Pouderoyen, West Bank, Demerara attempted to leap from the court’s gallery to the ground 40 feet below. He was subdued before he could have made the leap.

Before imposing penalty Justice Navindra Singh said he does not impose the death penalty, but in sentencing for murder, he begins with 60 years, and would add or subtract as the situation warrants.

In this particular case, he said, because the act was premeditated, he would add 10 years to the 60.

For cruelty, he would add five years; and because domestic violence ranks as a licence of frequency, he would add an additional six years to the sentence.

The accused had been incarcerated for three years, therefore he would deduct the three years from the total sentence.

Noting that the accused had proffered no mitigating circumstance, the judge sentenced the accused to 78 years’ imprisonment.

One day in March 2011, Kevin, who normally used to threaten his lover that he would take her life for being unfaithful to him, hired a taxi and took her to a canal at Houston, EBD.

The confession statement he gave to the police and his friends and relatives detailed that, on their way, he reminded her of her deeds, then he hugged her by the neck and jumped into the canal with her, where he kept squeezing her neck and holding her beneath the water until she became lifeless.

Thereafter, he placed some trash over her body, and left for home, where he told his relatives what had happened.

Kevin was represented by Attorney-at-law Mr. Melvyn Duke.