The Joint Court of Justice has sentenced K. F. (44) from Grenada to life imprisonment for committing the murder and manslaughter of the victims L.S. D. and E. R. in a hotel room at the Simpson Bay Resort in Sint Maarten, on December 5, 2016.

With this verdict the court upheld the verdict handed down by the Court of First Instance.

The first victim was invited by the suspect and his co-suspect, also his brother, T.J. F. (32) , to the hotel room on the pretext of making a deal in the criminal circuit. Both brothers were heavily armed, carrying a bushmaster pistol and an AK-47. The suspect's brother picked up the man outside of the hotel.

The unarmed victim had brought stolen jewelry with him, hidden in a diaper. However, the deal turned out to be a rip deal. The victim was robbed of his jewelry in the living room of the hotel apartment and beaten to death by the main suspect with a firearm.

He was hit on the head so hard that he bled, collapsed and lost consciousness. The suspect put him in the bathtub, checked his pulse and doused him with water, but he was found dead. The second victim was then picked up by the suspect's brother, who was waiting outside in the car for his friend. As an unwanted witness, he was beaten to death with a firearm immediately after entering the hotel room in the same way as the first victim. He was dragged to the hotel bed in the bedroom. The suspect then had a friend come with a van. The bodies were wrapped in a bedspread and sheet and transported to the Little Bay Pond in Sint Maarten. There the bodies were dumped in the water. Only after eight months, when the man of the van reported to the police, the skeletal remains of the victims were found and the investigation started.

The main suspect has confessed to beating the victims to death, but stated that both times this was done in self-defense. The Court finds that statement implausible. The Court attaches great importance to the statements of his girlfriend K.K.K. S who was also in the hotel room and was able to hear from the bedroom what happened in the living room. In addition, video recordings from the brother's phone were used as evidence. It resulted in a conviction of complicity in aggravated manslaughter, complicity in murder, complicity in disposing of the bodies and complicity in possession of firearms. The main suspect was also convicted for his escape from Point Blanche prison.

The main suspect had already been sentenced in 2007 to 21 years in prison for committing murder. He fled the prison in Sint Maarten on February 15, 2016, during a visit to the doctor and was on the run until August 4, 2017. During this period he committed this double homicide.

With regard to the imposition of life imprisonment, the Court considers that this sentence, in which a person is in principle imprisoned for life, should be reserved for very exceptional cases, involving very serious crimes and where the chance that the suspect — once again on free feet — will again commit very serious crimes, is of such magnitude that his return to society is no longer justifiable. In this case, the three judges of the Court consider that the high risk may already be apparent from the fact that the suspect, after his escape from prison, again committed a double homicide after a few months.

The suspect has thus demonstrated — even after that conviction and detention — that he does not care about applicable norms and values, nor about laws and decisions based on them by judicial authorities in a democratic constitutional state such as Sint Maarten. The judges also took into consideration that the suspect, who has three kills to his name, apparently lacks respect for the value of the life of a fellow human being, and that he was (heavily) armed again at the time of his arrest for the offenses in question. The psychiatrist is also of the opinion that the risk of recidivism is high. The Court also takes into account that the attitude of the accused during the trial has not produced a different impression. The suspect has not shown any regret or remorse. It has remained with repeatedly explaining his reading of the facts. In the end, he did not provide any openness and thus did not show any beginnings of any self-insight, let alone an intended change of course for the future, according to the Court.

The Prosecution's demand, a life sentence for the main suspect, is thus followed by the Court. The Court notes in this regard that, in view of the review under Article 1:30, anchored in the Penal Code, after 25 years of the life sentence have been executed , the legislation in Sint Maarten meets the requirements of Article 3 of the ECHR.

The brother of the main suspect was sentenced to 24 years in prison for his part, but a discount of 6 months was applied because the treatment in the first instance and on appeal lasted longer than the period considered reasonable in the jurisdiction.

The suspects and the Public Prosecutor have 14 days to appeal in cassation to the Supreme Court of the Netherlands.

The verdict can be read here: https://deeplink.rechtspraak.nl/uitspraak?id=ECLI:NL:OGHACMB:2022:9(external link)

(Press statement originally published by the Joint Court of Justice of Aruba, Curaçao, Sint Maarten and of Bonaire, Saint Eustatius and Saba )