Derek Achong
Senior Reporter
derek.achong@guardian.co.tt
A woman who has spent 30 years in prison for helping to kill two men in separate incidents in 1993 has failed in her bid to have a judge review the life sentence she received for the death of one victim.
Natasha De Leon’s appeal to the Privy Council was denied by three British Law Lords, who said her appeal “does not raise an arguable point of law of general public importance, nor is there a risk that a serious miscarriage of justice has occurred.”
De Leon sought the review while being re-sentenced for the murder of Chandranath Maharaj in 2024. She and her common-law husband, Darrin Thomas, were convicted in 1995.
Maharaj, a taxi driver from Princes Town, was killed during a robbery on February 6, 1993, in San Fernando, where the couple pretended to be passengers. His body was dumped in the sea, and his car abandoned. An autopsy revealed multiple stab wounds and a slit throat.
Both received the mandatory death penalty, which was commuted to life imprisonment in 2008 following the Privy Council ruling in Pratt and Morgan, which deemed executing the death penalty five years after conviction cruel and unusual.
High Court Judge Hayden St Clair-Douglas re-sentenced De Leon to 33 years, giving her only a few years left, considering time served.
During the re-sentencing, she requested a review of her manslaughter sentence for killing another taxi driver, Lambert Dookoo, who was murdered almost a month after Maharaj in similar circumstances.
De Leon and her brother Andre were convicted of manslaughter, while Thomas was acquitted in 2001.
Justice St Clair-Douglas suggested the review should be conducted by the Advisory Committee on the Power of Pardon (the Mercy Committee).
An appellate panel last June, comprising Judges Gillian Lucky, Malcolm Holdip, and Carla Brown-Antoine, dismissed her appeal but noted she could approach the Mercy Committee or file a civil constitutional challenge after serving her minimum term.
De Leon’s lawyer, Peter Carter, confirmed he is preparing her application for a presidential pardon to be considered by the committee.
