A Jamaican national who pleaded guilty to arson has been sentenced to time served and recommended for deportation.
Jason Dennis, 23, had been in custody since shortly after the offence occurred on 13 November 2004.
Within days of his arrest he admitted setting fire to the home in which his ex-girlfriend lived. He said he did not want to burn the house down and he knew she was not present. But he did not want her to have other men in the house.
That was part of the background detailed by Senior Crown Counsel Adam Roberts in Grand Court last week.
Photos showed minimal soot damage to a door and some household implements damaged.
Dennis also pleaded guilty to using the ICT network to harass, abuse and threaten.
According to the Crown’s summary of the case, Dennis was here on work permit in the construction industry. He and the complainant were involved in a relationship in early 2004.
There was some disagreement as to how long the relationship lasted, but they later continued as friends.
After Hurricane Ivan she lived with him for two weeks, and then moved into her own place, a one-bedroom wooden structure.
She purchased a cell phone and exchanged numbers with him.
Dennis began calling her and asking her for another chance, but she refused. He called her up to 50 times a day, then started sending text messages. At first she deleted them, then saved them to report to police.
Mr. Roberts said the texts started out in a pleading manner, then took a turn for the worse with increased insistence and name calling. The last message in early November was thoroughly abusive and intensely unpleasant.
On 11 November the young woman was awakened by someone shaking her door. Dennis later admitted going to her home after seeing her with another man.
On 13 November she received a call at work about a man running from her home and the home on fire.
After his arrest, Dennis admitted that jealousy was the motive.
Defence Attorney James Austin-Smith urged the court to consider Dennis’ previous good character, full admissions and guilty plea. He noted that in two recent local arson cases, the sentences had been 18 months. Those cases had involved potential danger to other people.
The defendant was asked if he wanted to say anything. Dennis replied that he had made a mistake and was deeply sorry. He said he had been drinking at the time and smoking an illegal substance. Since then, he had tried to mend his ways.
In passing sentence, Mr. Justice Dale Sanderson said the crime was inexplicable, but boiled down to insecurity and jealousy.
He accepted that the defendant knew the woman was not home and there was no real risk of harm.
Dennis had had a difficult break-up and was doing whatever he could in an attempt to rekindle the relationship.
According to a psychiatric report, Dennis had consumed 15 or 16 bottles of stout and smoked 15 ganja cigarettes on the evening before his offence. The report said this consumption might have impaired his judgement.
Having asked about remission practices and parole opportunities, the judge noted that if Dennis received a sentence of 15 months, he would have earned statutory remission of one-third.
If that sentence had been imposed last November, Dennis would have been released by now. In this way the judge arrived at the sentence of time served for arson. He imposed a sentence of one day for the phone harassment.
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