Cousins found guilty of shooting their own cousin in Baie-Mahault
A court in Basse-Terre imposed a heavy sentence on the shooter and a lighter sentence on his accomplice for an armed assault that occurred in September 2024 within the same family.
Cousins found guilty of shooting their own cousin in Baie-Mahault
A criminal jury sitting in Basse-Terre ruled on 17 June on a case of domestic violence. The alleged perpetrator of the gunfire received a sentence of fifteen years' imprisonment, accompanied by a security measure lasting a decade. His accomplice was handed a sentence of three years' detention by the court.
The tragedy had occurred at the end of September of the previous year in the municipality of Baie-Mahault. The young woman targeted, a member of the same family as her attackers, had been forced to take refuge in the toilet of the residence. There, she had endured several gunshots. Two projectiles struck her; one of them was not extracted from her chest until six months later.
During the proceedings, the public prosecutor's representative had sought slightly harsher sentences: around fifteen years for the one who had fired the pistol, and five years for the one who had assisted him. The magistrate had emphasised the difference in roles between the individual who had seized the weapon to aim at his relative and the one who had participated in the pursuit and then facilitated the escape.
The prosecution had also highlighted the criminal record of the shooter, who had been involved in four armed robberies — two before and two after the Baie-Mahault events. The complainant, represented by the law office of Me Gabriel Danchet-Gordien, today suffers from persistent anxiety and is receiving intensive psychiatric care.
The defence counsels of the accused presented mitigating arguments. One of them argued that his client had acted in a sudden fit of rage, after witnessing an assault against his mother. The other pleaded partial innocence of his client, arguing that he had not directly taken part in the violence. This latter argument had been rejected by the prosecution, which recalled that the second accused had accompanied the first throughout the entire operation.
Source: RCI Guadeloupe
Source: Google News GP — Crime