Justice Seymour Panton commented at a sentence hearing this week that there was an unhealthy fascination with guns developing here in Cayman and in other Caribbean territories.
‘Unhealthy’ is putting it mildly, and we’re sure two young men now sitting in Northward Prison will agree after receiving in the past two weeks a mandatory prison sentence of 10 years for possession of an unlicensed firearm.
Both young men were found in possession of a firearm, although neither was using that firearm in the commission of a crime. One of the young men is 18 years old and had no prior convictions. The other is 22 and has only minor prior convictions.
When the 18-year-old was arrested with the gun, he said ‘my life is over.’
Still, both young men will now have a long time to sit in prison thinking about their crime. Even if they get parole – which is not certain – after serving the required five-ninths of their sentence, they will be in prison a little more than five and a half years.
The amended law requiring the mandatory sentence was passed in November 2005, after a rash of gun violence took place.
Justice Panton said he preferred the Firearms Law before it was changed. There was still a provision for a sentence up to 20 years for an unlicensed firearm back then, but judges also had discretion in sentencing.
When the legislators passed the law, they said they wanted to get tough on crime. And so they did.
Justice Panton said the legislators represent the people and that they were elected to pass laws. The courts must deals with the laws as they are.
The Cayman Islands Human Rights Committee has questioned the propriety of the minimum sentence and urges the government to amend the law to take into consideration exceptional circumstances relating to the offence or the offender and to make it unjust to impose the minimum sentence in all circumstances.
The CIHRC also suggested a discount of up to one-third of the sentence if the defendant pled guilty.
Oftentimes legislators will revisit a law after they’ve seen it in use for some time. Perhaps this is a law legislators will revisit.
Until that time, if it ever happens, the young men and others living among us who find guns fascinating would be wise to only read about them in books. To simply possess an unlicensed gun could land them in prison for a long, long time.
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