The Court of Appeal has turned down Luisto Eusebio Hernandez’s appeal against his conviction for the attempted murder of his father-in-law.
Hernandez was convicted after a jury trial of attempted murder and possession of an unlicensed weapon on 8 June 2023, and sentenced by Grand Court Justice Roger Chapple to 21 years in prison.
During his trial, the court had heard that Hernandez had shot his father-in-law following a heated dispute about how to feed Hernandez’s young child a mango, at an address at Oakland Drive, George Town, on the evening of 20 April 2022.
The jury had heard that the two had argued after the victim advised Hernandez that the mango he was feeding his son was too big and should be cut into smaller pieces. The jurors were told Hernandez swore at his father-in-law, who threw a bottle at him, which shattered and possibly injured Hernandez’s daughter.
Prosecutors claimed Hernandez left and returned a short time later with the firearm and shot the victim twice.
Regarding the identity of the shooter, the victim told the court that as soon as he saw Hernandez return, he had crouched down and was shot through a wall. “The hand came through the door after I was on the ground. It was his hand. I know it was his. We all live in the same house, and I know his body features and build,” the man said.
Under cross-examination, the victim had said when Hernandez returned, he heard someone shout “Luisto”, and then turned around, saw Hernandez and crouched down.
Hernandez answered no questions during his police interview and did not give evidence in his trial. His defence case was that the victim was lying.
Identification argument
Jonathon Hughes, who represented Hernandez at trial, had submitted that before the jury could rely on the evidence that someone had shouted “Luisto” (Hernandez’s first name) as proof of identification of the shooter, the judge should warn them that they had to be sure it was “accurately reported, spontaneous and genuine”. He said it was “second-hand hearsay which required a careful direction”, the appeals court judges noted in their ruling.
Chapple had responded that it was “impossible to imagine a situation of fabrication. In the particular circumstances of this case, if [the complainant] is right that a gunman arrives and someone says ‘Luisto’, I think it is a direction which is frankly laughable to say to the jury, ‘well, you need to consider whether this is fabrication on the part of the third person who said Luisto’.”
One of the grounds for the appeal presented to the panel of three appeal judges was that Chapple should have given fuller directions to the jury, with regard to the identification evidence. The appeals court judges disagreed, saying Chapple was “perfectly entitled, for the reasons he gave, to deal with this aspect of the evidence in the way that he did”.
The judges, in their ruling, pointed out that Chapple had told the jurors they had to be sure the victim was correct when he said he heard someone shout Hernandez’s name, and that they should bear in mind that the person who shouted may have been mistaken. “Unless the jury was sure that his evidence was truthful, whether about what he said was shouted or about his identification, they could not convict, as the judge made clear,” Court of Appeal president Sir John Golding wrote in the ruling.
He concluded, “In short, there is no merit in these grounds of appeal, and the application for leave is refused.”
An oral judgment on this appeal was handed down on 15 May 2025 and approved for public release on 26 Feb. 2026.
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