Derek Achong

On Ju­ly 23, this year, cit­i­zens from across T&T breathed a col­lec­tive sigh of re­lief as two ju­ve­nile of­fend­ers turned men were con­vict­ed of the heinous mur­der of Sean Luke.

Al­most 15 years and four months ear­li­er, six-year-old Luke went miss­ing on­ly to be found days lat­er in an aban­doned sug­ar cane field near his Hen­ry Street, Or­ange Val­ley Road, Cou­va, home.

An au­top­sy, which re­vealed that he died from in­ter­nal in­juries and bleed­ing aris­ing out of be­ing sodom­ized with sug­ar cane stalk, still haunts the vet­er­an pathol­o­gist who per­formed it and al­most all who heard of de­tails of the fi­nal hor­rif­ic mo­ments of his short life from her re­port.

Akeel Mitchell and Richard Cha­too were charged with the hor­rif­ic crime and were on­ly able to elect a judge-alone be­fore Jus­tice Lisa Ram­sumair-Hinds af­ter spend­ing well over a decade on re­mand.

Mitchell and Cha­too’s case was one of eight mur­der in­dict­ments that were dis­posed of by the Ju­di­cia­ry over the 2020/2021 Law Term by util­is­ing vir­tu­al hear­ings due to the clo­sure of court build­ings dur­ing the on­go­ing COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

The use of tech­nol­o­gy did not on­ly al­low the tri­al to be com­plet­ed safe­ly and quick­ly over the course of four months but al­so al­lowed cit­i­zens to get a brief and rare glimpse in­to the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem with over 1,500 tun­ing in to a live link to wit­ness Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds de­liv­er her long-await­ed ver­dict in the case.

Ac­cord­ing to the ev­i­dence in the case, 13-year-old Mitchell, who is the step­son of Cha­too’s broth­er, was stay­ing at 15-year-old Cha­too’s home, which was lo­cat­ed with­in me­tres of Luke’s.

State pros­e­cu­tors led the ev­i­dence of res­i­dents Avinash Ba­boolal and Arvis Pradeep, who claimed that Cha­too had in­vit­ed Luke to ac­com­pa­ny them on a fish­ing ex­pe­di­tion or­gan­ised by Ba­boolal.

Both Ba­boolal and Pradeep claimed that they saw Luke, Cha­too and Mitchell en­ter an aban­doned sug­ar­cane field, where Luke’s body was even­tu­al­ly found, with on­ly Cha­too and Mitchell emerg­ing.

Sean Luke and his mom Pauline.

How­ev­er, while Ba­boolal claimed that they en­tered the field on their way to the riv­er, Pradeep claimed the di­ver­sion came when they were re­turn­ing.

Both claimed that they heard a strange noise em­a­nat­ing from the area but nei­ther went in to in­ves­ti­gate.

In her de­ci­sion, Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds said she be­lieved Ba­boolal but not Pradeep, as his (Pradeep) ev­i­dence was rid­dled with in­con­sis­ten­cies and bizarre state­ments.

“Red flags were at full mast when he (Pradeep) be­gan his ev­i­dence,” Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds said.

Through­out the tri­al, Cha­too and Mitchell’s lawyers sug­gest­ed that the mur­der was in fact com­mit­ted by Ba­boolal, who they al­leged sought to im­pli­cate the duo to cov­er his tracks.

They point­ed to the fact that af­ter Luke’s moth­er Pauline Bharath re­port­ed him miss­ing, Ba­boolal joined fel­low vil­lagers in search­ing for him but chose not to lead the search par­ty to the area in which he lat­er claimed he last saw Luke.

They al­so high­light­ed the fact that Ba­boolal did not re­veal that Luke had ac­com­pa­nied them on the fish­ing ex­pe­di­tion un­til he was ar­rest­ed along­side the duo.

Cha­too’s lawyer Evans Welch went as far as to sug­gest that vil­lagers were on the right track to iden­ti­fy­ing who was re­spon­si­ble for the grue­some mur­der when they set fire to Ba­boolal’s home when he was re­leased from cus­tody.

“The po­lice dropped the ball by let­ting Avinash go. The vil­lagers who burned down Avinash’s house had far bet­ter in­stincts than the po­lice,” Welch said.

Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds spent a con­sid­er­able por­tion of her de­ci­sion re­ject­ing the re­peat­ed in­sin­u­a­tions against Ba­boolal.

“I re­main sure, on the ev­i­dence, that Avinash Ba­boolal was not in­volved,” she said.

“Avinash Ba­boolal was sim­ply not sure what on earth was go­ing on. He did not re­alise what he knew,” Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds said, as she not­ed that he would have be­lieved Luke went home af­ter defe­cat­ing in the sug­ar­cane field as claimed by Cha­too, when he re­joined the group.

Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds al­so had to con­sid­er a video-record­ed con­fes­sion state­ment, in which Cha­too im­pli­cat­ed him­self and Mitchell when they were ar­rest­ed by po­lice.

Flashback March: Randolph Bharatt, father of murder victim Andrea Bharatt, hugs Pauline Lum Fai, mother of Sean Luke, during the Candlelight Movement meeting at the Barakah Grounds, Narsaloo Ramayah Road, Chaguanas.

SHASTRI BOODAN

In the record­ing, Cha­too claimed that Mitchell, who was spend­ing time at his home, re­quest­ed that he (Mitchell) have sex with him.

Ac­cord­ing to Cha­too, af­ter he re­fused, he re­luc­tant­ly agreed to Mitchell’s re­quest to in­tro­duce him to Luke, who was his (Cha­too) neigh­bour.

Cha­too claimed that he mere­ly held Luke’s hands and cov­ered his mouth as Mitchell raped him and then sodom­ized him with the sug­ar­cane stalk.

How­ev­er, Cha­too elect­ed to tes­ti­fy in his de­fence dur­ing the tri­al and claimed that he fab­ri­cat­ed the con­fes­sion as he was threat­ened and co­erced by homi­cide de­tec­tives.

Cha­too de­nied any wrong­do­ing and claimed that Mitchell did not ac­com­pa­ny the group on the fish­ing trip. He al­so sought to sug­gest that Ba­boolal may have been the per­pe­tra­tor.

Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds not­ed that Cha­too’s ini­tial con­fes­sion was not re­li­able as there were in­con­sis­ten­cies and be­cause he sought to down­play his in­volve­ment.

She re­ject­ed his sub­se­quent claims of po­lice mis­con­duct as she ruled that the homi­cide de­tec­tives in the case had pro­vid­ed clear and co­gent ev­i­dence.

Luke’s case was the first in which a lo­cal DNA lab­o­ra­to­ry was used.

Al­though DNA test­ing equip­ment was avail­able at the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre in St James since 2001, the equip­ment was not prop­er­ly cal­i­brat­ed when the Of­fice of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP) re­quest­ed the test­ing of court ex­hibits in April 2018.

The Wood­brook-based Caribbean Foren­sics Cen­tre was sub­se­quent­ly cer­ti­fied to per­form such test­ing and the tests were per­formed short­ly be­fore the tri­al be­gan in March.

In his tes­ti­mo­ny, the com­pa­ny’s lab­o­ra­to­ry di­rec­tor Dr Mau­rice Aboud ruled that Mitchell could not be ex­clud­ed as a mi­nor con­trib­u­tor to the mixed sam­ple that was lift­ed from a se­men de­posit on Luke’s cloth­ing. Cha­too was not linked to the se­men.

A par­tial DNA pro­file was found on the sug­ar­cane stalk and on anal swabs tak­en dur­ing Luke’s au­top­sy but it was not linked to ei­ther Mitchell or Cha­too.

While Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds ac­cept­ed Dr Aboud’s ev­i­dence, she still crit­i­cised the de­lay in test­ing.

“I find that un­ac­cept­able,” Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds said, as she not­ed that some sam­ples col­lect­ed had de­te­ri­o­rat­ed over the lengthy pe­ri­od.

As a sec­ondary is­sue in the case, Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds had to con­sid­er whether a le­gal prin­ci­ple over the men­tal ca­pac­i­ty of a child un­der 14 to have crim­i­nal in­tent ap­plied to Mitchell.

Akeel Mitchell

She stat­ed that it was re­butted as Mitchell was weeks short of his 14th birth­day and based on the ev­i­dence was aware that his ac­tions were wrong as he sought to give him­self a false al­i­bi by wait­ing by Luke’s home and speak­ing to his moth­er be­fore the oth­er chil­dren re­turned.

“He (Mitchell) pushed the cane stalk un­til there was nowhere else to go,” she said.

The case had an ob­vi­ous ef­fect on Luke’s still trau­ma­tised moth­er Pauline Bharath, who broke down while tes­ti­fy­ing ear­ly in the tri­al.

The mere sight of the pair of cloth­ing her son was wear­ing the last time she saw him alive was enough to make Bharath, who was ad­mirably com­posed for much of her tes­ti­mo­ny, break down in pain and an­guish.

“It’s my ba­by un­der­wear. His jock­ey shorts,” Barath screamed.

In her ev­i­dence, Bharath re­count­ed that on the day of the in­ci­dent she and Luke went to sleep to­geth­er and she awoke to find him miss­ing.

Bharath claimed that she found Mitchell sit­ting un­der a shed in front of her prop­er­ty and he told her that he did not know where Luke was.

Bharath said she was not im­me­di­ate­ly con­cerned by her son’s dis­ap­pear­ance as he would nor­mal­ly vis­it rel­a­tives, who lived near­by un­at­tend­ed.

“I was nev­er con­cerned be­cause I lived around my fam­i­ly,” Bharath said.

She claimed that Mitchell stayed with her for a short while un­til Cha­too and a group of boys from their com­mu­ni­ty were walk­ing by her house.

She claimed that Cha­too, who she said would come over to play with Luke in the past, al­so de­nied know­ing where Luke was.

Bharath said she then be­gan go­ing to rel­a­tives and neigh­bours’ homes in search of her son.

Bharath claimed that when she re­turned to the com­mu­ni­ty, Mitchell told her that he had seen Luke go­ing in­to an­oth­er track with a tall man dressed in white.

Mitchell’s un­cle and Cha­too’s step­fa­ther Ray­mond Bruzual, who he (Mitchell) had moved in with about three weeks pri­or, then came over and re­layed the same in­for­ma­tion about the man in white.

Bharath gave the in­for­ma­tion to po­lice when she re­port­ed Luke miss­ing and went in search of Luke’s fa­ther as he matched the de­scrip­tion giv­en.

The even­tu­al out­come in the case was of lit­tle com­fort to Bharath.

Richard Chatoo

“I just paused there and I took it in. It brings me no joy...This brought me no joy at all,” Bharath said, in an in­ter­view af­ter the ver­dicts.

In her ev­i­dence, foren­sic pathol­o­gist foren­sic pathol­o­gist Dr Es­lyn Mc­Don­ald-Bur­ris said that even af­ter 15 years and hun­dreds of au­top­sies, she is still trau­ma­tised by her work in the case.

“I did not re­alise it would have such a neg­a­tive ef­fect on me,” she added.

Dur­ing her tes­ti­mo­ny, Dr Mc­Don­ald-Bur­ris said that af­ter an ex­ter­nal and in­ter­nal ex­am­i­na­tion of Luke’s de­com­pos­ing body she con­clud­ed that he died of in­ter­nal ab­dom­i­nal and chest in­juries caused by a 54 cm sug­ar­cane stalk that was in­sert­ed through his anus.

“It was up through the anus and rec­tum; through the blad­der, pelvic and ab­dom­i­nal cav­i­ties; per­fo­rat­ing the bow­els, stom­ach and di­aphragm; en­ter­ing the chest cav­i­ty; per­fo­rat­ing the oe­soph­a­gus and peri­car­dial sac and caus­ing lac­er­a­tions to heart and right lung; end­ing at the up­per bor­der of the chest cav­i­ty near the col­lar­bone,” she ex­plained.

Mc­Don­ald-Bur­ris al­so not­ed that de­spite the ex­tent of the in­ter­nal in­juries Luke would have sur­vived for ap­prox­i­mate­ly 10 to 30 min­utes be­fore he suc­cumbed.

“I do not think death was in­stan­ta­neous,” she said.

While Cha­too and Mitchell’s de­fence team were seek­ing to dis­cred­it Dr Mc­Don­ald-Bur­ris’ ev­i­dence, their plan back­fired as their pathol­o­gist Pro­fes­sor Hu­bert Dais­ley, who did not ex­am­ine Luke’s body for a sec­ond au­top­sy but sim­ply re­viewed Dr Mc­Don­ald-Bur­ris’ notes, sup­port­ed her find­ings in the case.

“He (Luke) would have been in a lot of agony,” Dais­ley said, as he claimed that Luke would have pos­si­bly sur­vived for five to six min­utes be­fore he suc­cumbed to in­ter­nal in­juries to his lungs, di­aphragm, heart and in­testines.

While there were nu­mer­ous calls for the duo to face the death penal­ty, it could not ap­ply to Cha­too and Mitchell as they were mi­nors when they com­mit­ted the crime.

In T&T, per­sons con­vict­ed of com­mit­ting mur­der while they are mi­nors are de­tained at the court’s plea­sure and may be el­i­gi­ble for re­lease af­ter serv­ing a manda­to­ry min­i­mum term set by the court.

Even up­on com­plet­ing the term, a for­mer ju­ve­nile of­fend­er would on­ly earn their free­dom if a judge is con­vinced that they have been suf­fi­cient­ly re­ha­bil­i­tat­ed and are no longer a threat to so­ci­ety.

In sen­tenc­ing the duo in Sep­tem­ber, Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds set manda­to­ry min­i­mum terms for Mitchell and Cha­too at 17 and a half years and 11 and a half years in prison, re­spec­tive­ly.

Sean Luke

In cal­cu­lat­ing the manda­to­ry min­i­mums for the duo, Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds be­gan with a start­ing point of 35 years for Mitchell and 33 years for Cha­too.

Cha­too’s start­ing point was low­er as he played a sec­ondary role in Luke’s mur­der.

Mitchell’s start­ing point was in­creased by five years based on his prin­ci­pal ac­tions in Luke’s mur­der, which in­clud­ed him plac­ing him­self near Luke’s moth­er af­ter the mur­der to give him an al­i­bi.

“It is the chill­ing re­al­i­sa­tion of the ab­sence of re­morse, wor­ry and fear in some­one so young. I know chil­dren who are ter­ri­fied of be­ing caught,” Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds said.

She went on: “I can not quite cap­ture the na­ture of the crim­i­nal de­viance of a 13-year-old in killing a woman’s son and mo­ments lat­er sit­ting feet from her.”

How­ev­er, Jus­tice Ram­sumair-Hinds re­duced his sen­tence by sev­en years due to his age at the time of the mur­der and the fact that he had a pos­i­tive re­port from prison in terms of dis­ci­pli­nary in­frac­tions and par­tic­i­pa­tion in ed­u­ca­tion­al and vo­ca­tion­al pro­grammes.

Cha­too did not re­ceive an up­lift in his sen­tence but was af­ford­ed a six-year re­duc­tion based on his age and pos­i­tive prison record.

The time they spend on re­mand be­fore they even­tu­al­ly went on tri­al was al­so de­duct­ed from the sen­tences.