Latest update February 24th, 2025 9:02 AM
Appeal Court orders new trial for man on Death Row
The Court of Appeal has handed down a decision overturning the conviction and sentence of murder accused, Gowkarran Ramdyal. In 2011, the accused was sentenced to death by hanging for murder.
Gowkarran Ramdyal
However, last Wednesday, after hearing an appeal, the Court ordered a new High Court trial for the man who is described as mentally ill by his attorney.
As such, the trial is expected to come in this sitting of the Demerara Criminal Assizes. The court essentially upheld submissions of Attorney Adrian Thompson had earlier argued that in the High Court, the judge failed to consider his client‘s mental condition and whether he was fit to stand trial.
In 2011, Ramdyal called “Silence”, 25, of Queenstown, Corriverton, was found guilty of killing his father. Justice Dawn Gregory sentenced Ramdyal to death.
According to the facts of the case, Ramdyal who lived with his father, mother and younger brother was accused of killing his father, 51- year-old Bhowan Ramdyal, on January 16, 2008.
The senior Ramdyal was allegedly beaten with an iron bar about his body at their home after a misunderstanding with his son on the October 10, 2007, over money.
Gowkarran Ramdyal had asked his father for $100, which the senior Ramdyal had refused to give him, telling his son that he should seek a job.
An argument then developed during which the accused picked up an iron bar and beat his father.
He then picked up a pipe and continued the beating, before walking out of the yard with the pipe in his hand.
The injured man was picked up and rushed to the Skeldon Hospital, then to the New Amsterdam Hospital before being transferred to the country’s main medical institution in the city.
The elder Ramdyal was discharged from hospital a month later and stayed at his niece’s home for a while before returning to the Skeldon Hospital, after suffering a relapse. He subsequently succumbed to his injuries.
Prior to his conviction, Ramdyal’s state-appointed attorney, in summation, told the court about the discrepancies in the witnesses’ testimonies, pointing to evidence given by the mother and son of the accused, concerning the different times they saw the accused beating his father.
The attorney also mentioned some discrepancies in the testimonies of the doctor.
But State Prosecutor Dionne McCammon in her presentation noted that even if the witnesses’ evidence was not enough, the accused can be convicted on circumstantial evidence.
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