An ex-soldier will spend the next three years behind bars for “betraying” his country for “the criminal element”. That was the remainder of a ten-year sentence imposed on Ramon Omar St Hill by Justice Carlisle Greaves on Monday for having three illegal guns on April 30, 2020, and 79 rounds of ammunition on March 17, 2019.
According to some of the evidence disclosed in the No. 3 Supreme Court, St Hill, of Church Gap, King Street, St Michael, had stashed the weapons and ammunition for another man with whom he was staying.
The co-accused was previously sentenced to ten years in prison by another judge.
“You spent six years in the BDF [Barbados Defence Force], a disciplined force, enforcing the law, helping . . . to ensure that no illegal guns coming in, going out, or going around and yet here you are,” the judge said after St Hill apologised for his actions.
Defence attorney Lalu Hanuman disclosed that the convict’s parents died when he was in his early teens and he became homeless. He eventually met his co-accused with whom he resided.
But the judge, who described the case as a “troubling one”, insisted that “there is always the choice of taking the narrow path or the wide one”.
Justice Greaves explained that St Hill was living from “pillar to post” until he met “this employer who took you in”.
“He is in the construction field and it seems he is in the firearms field as well. You assisted him to hide these firearms in the ceiling. Your instinct as a soldier of this country, . . . fashioned by our disciplined forces under which you took an oath to this country – to serve it well, to adhere to its laws – deep in your 30s you fell into something like that just for some lodging. That appears to be a real excuse,” the judge said.
He added that given St Hill was a mature person, he should not have gotten involved in such an enterprise.
“You cannot sell out your country; that’s what you gunmen are doing. You cannot sell out your country for trinkets. You sang and marched under the National Anthem . . . . Listen to the words in there which you knew by heart [but] you betrayed your country to the criminal element.
“You probably owed a greater duty to this country and trust than others who have not had the opportunity to serve as you have had,” added the judge who said from the number of firearms and ammunition St Hill had, one could draw the inference of an intent that “could not be good”.
“I think we can say that the nation is tired of it all. It seems as though no matter what you say or do there seem to be a youthful cohort in our country who seem determined to continue to arm themselves with these lethal weapons and to cause misery and havoc in our society. But the courts must not relent. Other agencies may do their part to assist in bringing this under control and the courts must play their parts . . . they must not relent.”
State Counsel Kevin Forde had suggested a starting point of 12 years in prison be imposed on St Hill. The judge said while he understood the prosecutor’s argument for a higher starting point, he accepted the defence’s position that St Hill’s transgression “was perhaps no greater than the co-defendant”.
Justice Greaves then started with a sentence of ten years from which he deducted a one-third discount as well as five months for his mitigating factors. St Hill was also credited for the three years and three months he spent on remand, leaving him with three more years to serve.
“You have a lot of making up to do to this country because you betrayed it,” the judge told the first-time offender. ]]>
