In an historic judgement that represented a groundbreaking day in the country’s judicial system, Senior Justice Anita Allen yesterday sentenced convicted murderer Maxo Tido to death for the 2002 murder of 16-year-old Donnell Connover.
Tido is the first murder convict to face discretionary sentencing and Justice Allen is the first trial judge to exercise discretion in a murder case in a Bahamian court, since the Privy Council ruled last month that the mandatory death sentence in The Bahamas is unconstitutional.
In her judgement on sentencing handed down Thursday afternoon, the Supreme Court judge said she was satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that the appropriate sentence in this case was death.
Tido was convicted of murdering Miss Connover on March 20, days after the Privy Council’s ruling was handed down.
Since that decision, judges of the Supreme Court of The Bahamas now have the responsibility to decide the appropriate sentence on a conviction of murder, specifically whether to impose the death penalty or a lesser penalty.
During the trial, the court heard how the teenager was lured from her home in the early morning hours of May 2, 2002, her body battered and bruised and her skull crushed. Evidence also revealed that parts of Miss Conover’s body had been burned after her death.
“Having carefully considered all [aggravating and mitigating] factors and having weighed them with [specified] objectives of sentencing, I conclude that this is a case in which the aggravating factors clearly outweigh the mitigating factors,” Justice Allen said in her judgement.
“The aggravating factors are particularly heinous and cruel. And as if that were not enough, the body of the victim was significantly burned after her death. In my view, this case is at the top end of the range of criminal culpability.”
In deciding the circumstances surrounding the murder, Justice Allen said that she considered all of the evidence placed before the jury during the trial, including medical evidence that Miss Conover died from a crush injury to the head, the finding of multiple abrasions and contusions on her body, her age and the degree of deliberation of the offender.
Justice Allen said that she disagreed with the defence that she was obliged to determine the weapon used to inflict the crush injury to the head of the victim, specifically whether it was a large stone or the tires of a vehicle, to determine the degree of the deliberation of the offender.
“In my view, that determination would indicate the degree of suffering experienced by the victim before she died and not the degree of deliberation of the offender,” said Justice Allen.
The justice noted that she considered the abrasions and contusions found on Miss Conover’s body an aggravating factor, as well as evidence of the truck’s owner that the offender borrowed the truck because he said “he had something important to do.”
“From this evidence I infer, reasonably I hope, deliberation on the part of the offender. I believe if can be reasonably inferred that the something important was the plan to pick up the victim and murder her,” said Justice Allen.
The justice pointed out that against the aggravating factors, she weighed the mitigating circumstances, such as the age of Tido, who was 24 at the time of the offence, and she considered that his record showed only three previous offences of violence.
“With respect to his abandonment by his parents at an early age [5] and whether that may have influence his conduct in committing the offence, given the evidence that he was brought up in a cohesive family unit and the evidence that he had no problems socialising and interacting with others, I am of the view that this did not influence his conduct in committing this offence,” said Justice Allen.
Regarding whether Tido is considered “reformable,” Justice Allen said that while anything is possible, given the circumstances of this crime, she felt there was no reasonable prospect of that.
“In any event, given the gravity of this offence, the circumstances of its commission and the prevalence of this type of offence in this community, I have determined that objectives of punishment in this case should be retribution and deterrence,” said Justice Allen.
The judgement brought tears to the eyes of Lavern Connover, Donnell’s mother, who cried quietly at the back of the courtroom.
Tido sat emotionless as he waited to be handcuffed and taken to death row.
Director of Public Prosecutions Bernard Turner, who was seeking the death penalty for Tido, said after the judgement that the sentencing set a precedent in terms of procedure.
“The precedent is set in terms of the procedure which needs to be followed. The only precedent set is the procedure which needs to be followed now, following upon a person being convicted of murder, and that procedure is what the judge dealt with,” said Mr. Turner explained.
Tido’s lawyer, Wayne Munroe, who was seeking a maximum prison sentence of seven years for his client, said an appeal of the sentencing and conviction would be filed over the next few days.
Justice Allen noted that in the absence of any statutory guidelines for determining the appropriate sentence on a conviction of murder, she made the decision in accordance with her judicial oath and the judicial principle that the punishment imposed on a convicted person should always be proportionate to the gravity of the crime.
By: Erica Wells, The Bahama Journal
