- Jails 2 rape accused for 35 years
“WOMEN must be able to walk the streets and visit public places unmolested”, Judge Jainarayan Singh said yesterday, as he sentenced two rape accused, Shawn Mc Intyre and Troy Charles, to 15 and 20 years respectively for raping a 20-year-old Amerindian girl in 2004.

The 35 year prison sentence was imposed on the men after an 11-member jury found the accused guilty — Mc Intyre by a majority verdict in the proportion of 10 to one, and Charles by a unanimous verdict.

Before imposing sentence, Judge Singh told the accused, “The time has come in Guyana when our women must be able to walk the streets and go into restaurants, bars and public places without being molested by the criminal element.”

The judge added, “There is no shortage of women in this country. No one has the right to hold down a woman and rape her as did at Patterson’s Resort on December 15, 2004.

Mc Intyre, who according to the State’s case, led by Prosecutor Kara Duff-Yehudah, had ordered Charles, his partner in crime, to rape the victim, now 24-years-old, was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment.

Mc Intyre hitherto had a clean record as against Troy Charles, who is at present serving a prison term for rape.

Charles, who, the judge observed, seems to have a problem, was jailed for 20 years.

Defence counsel Compton Richardson had led a defence of mistaken identity. But the jury, by their verdict, believed the story as told by the victim. She had told the judge and jury that she was standing outside a benab when she was attacked by the two accused who held her and threw her to the ground.

Following orders from Mc Intyre to Charles to rape her, Charles carried out the instructions. Firstly he drew a knife from his pocket, threatened her with the weapon by telling her he would kill her if she talked. Then he removed her under garment and sexually assaulted her. The sex ordeal, she said, lasted for about 30 minutes.

The victim, after being released, reported the matter to relatives and friends and the Police. She was later seen by a doctor whose report corroborated her story that she was raped.