JENSEN LA VENDE

Se­nior Re­porter

jensen.lavende@guardian.co.tt

The State has ap­pealed a High Court judge’s de­ci­sion to sen­tence a man to four years in prison af­ter he plead­ed guilty felony mur­der.

Rasheed Mustafa was sen­tenced to a to­tal of 38 years in prison but will serve four years and 11 months af­ter de­duc­tions and time served were tak­en in­to ac­count. He will be re­leased be­fore his 30th birth­day.

The 21-year-old, who ad­mit­ted to be­ing par­ty to the killing of a man while wear­ing an an­kle mon­i­tor, plead­ed guilty to felony mur­der and pos­ses­sion of arms and am­mu­ni­tion on Sep­tem­ber 17 in a plea-bar­gain­ing agree­ment with the State. He was in­dict­ed on April 17, 2024, and sought to en­ter a plea on Sep­tem­ber 10.

Mustafa, who was 18 at the time of the in­ci­dent, plead­ed guilty in the killing of Jevon Roberts on Au­gust 24, 2022.

Roberts, of apart­ment 1-2 Harpe Place, Port-of-Spain, was gunned down at Ar­gyle Street, Bel­mont.

For his guilty plea, two-thirds of the 28 years were de­duct­ed, ar­riv­ing at a ten-year start­ing point. High Court Judge Nali­ni Singh then de­duct­ed time spent in pre-tri­al cus­tody, and a fur­ther two years, four months, and 19 days were shaved off, leav­ing the felony mur­der sen­tence to four years, sev­en months and 11 days.

For pos­ses­sion of the gun and am­mu­ni­tion, he was slapped with the start­ing point of a ten-year sen­tence.

Mustafa, who was rep­re­sent­ed by pub­lic de­fend­er Chimere Gib­son-Wa­di, had sev­en years shaved off that sen­tence, three for his guilty plea, an­oth­er three for good char­ac­ter, and one year for the mit­i­gat­ing fac­tors.

The fi­nal pun­ish­ment af­ter the dis­count was a two-year sen­tence. With time spent in pre-tri­al cus­tody, he was con­sid­ered to have al­ready paid his debt to so­ci­ety.

The State, how­ev­er, is ap­peal­ing the sen­tenc­ing and the rubric used at ar­riv­ing at the de­ci­sion.

Mustafa was ar­rest­ed in May 2023, af­ter CCTV footage and an­kle mon­i­tor­ing records were re­viewed. At the time of the killing, Mustafa was out on bail for an­oth­er of­fence and had an an­kle mon­i­tor­ing de­vice on as a con­di­tion of his bail.

Ac­cord­ing to the agreed-on facts based on the plea agree­ment, when Mustafa was ar­rest­ed and shown the CCTV footage and the records of his pres­ence at the scene of the killing, he said: “Of­fi­cer, way boy, ste­ups.”