A man who was recently re-sentenced for the murders of three of his relatives has claimed that he should be immediately released from prison.
Late last month, 39-year-old Daniel Agard was given a 28-year sentence for murdering his great-grandmother, great-aunt and great-uncle in 2001.
However, he was left with a remaining sentence of five years and four months after the time he already served in prison was deducted.
After his re-sentencing, Agard filed a judicial review lawsuit alleging that he would have completed the sentence if he was granted remission by prison officials.
Under the remission procedure, sentences are reduced based on convicts’ behaviour whilst in prison.
Last week, Agard was granted leave by High Court Judge Carol Gobin to pursue the lawsuit.
His case, which was deemed fit for urgent hearing during the Judiciary’s annual vacation period, is scheduled to come up for hearing on Friday.
Agard and Lester Pittman were accused of murdering agricultural consultant John Cropper, his mother-in-law Maggie Lee, 68, and sister-in-law Lynette Lithgow-Pearson, 57.
Cropper was Agrad’s great-uncle, Maggie Lee was his great-grandmother, and Lithgow-Pearson was his great-aunt.
The three relatives were killed at Cropper’s Cascade home in December 2001. Their bodies were found by Cropper’s housekeeper the following day.
They were all bound and gagged with electrical wire and their throats had been slit.
Lithgow-Pearson, a former television broadcaster with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and her mother were found in the same room, while Cropper was found in the bathtub.
Cropper’s wife Angela, a former Independent senator and deputy director of the United Nations Environmental Programme was not at home at the time of the murders. In November 2012, she died in London after a protracted illness.
In 2004, Agard and Pittman were convicted of the triple murder.
The Court of Appeal eventually quashed Agard’s conviction and ordered a retrial but upheld Pittman’s conviction.
Pittman successfully challenged his conviction before the Privy Council, with the British Law Lords remitting the case to the Appeal Court for them to consider whether his conviction was safe considering new evidence over his mental state.
The Appeal Court eventually upheld Pittman’s conviction but sentenced him to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 40 years before he could be released.
Agard was again convicted on his retrial.
While he was initially given the mandatory death penalty, the sentence was commuted after the five-year period for lawfully carrying it out expired.
His re-sentencing exercise was as a result of a landmark Privy Council decision from 2022, in which the country’s highest appellate court ruled that convicted murderers, who cannot be executed because of delays in carrying out the mandatory sentence for murder, should receive definitive prison terms as opposed to commuted sentences for the remainder of their lives.
In passing the sentence on Agard, High Court Judge Gillian Scotland raised concerns over his ability to successfully reintegrate into society when he completes his sentence.
Justice Scotland pointed to Agard’s failure to participate in prison training programmes and his multiple breaches of prison rules.
She suggested that he still had time to improve and participate in rehabilitation programmes.
“There are issues of rehabilitation that need to be addressed before he is released,” she said.
In his lawsuit, Agard is contending that the prison rules related to remissions were not properly applied to him.
“The prison authorities wrongfully calculated the term of imprisonment I was required to serve,” he said in his affidavit attached to the lawsuit.
“I accept that the State is entitled to punish me for the crimes that I was found guilty of committing, however, the power of the State to deprive me of my liberty is limited by the lawful execution of the order of imprisonment that was imposed on me,” he added.
Agard is being represented by Gerald Ramdeen, Wayne Sturge, Lemuel Murphy, and Dayadai Harripaul.
