Sanction parents, too, says acting DPP

Parents who are proven negligent in managing their children’s behaviour should face sanctions if their children commit serious crimes, Acting Director of Public Prosecutions Alliston Seale SC has suggested.

 

He said: “No 13-year-old should be able to run wild and hang out on a block, smoke dope and have knives, and there’s no intervention whatsoever, and nobody get lock up other than him? I say that some parents want locking up! If we are supposed to save this generation, we have got to say that parents have to take a greater role, and not just a greater role by choice, a greater role with sanctions if they fail, and when their children commit certain crimes, they should be facing prison for the actions of their children.”

 

The top prosecutor highlighted that some countries were already taking such steps, noting a case in the United States where the mother of a six-year-old who shot a teacher at school was jailed for six years on child neglect and federal weapons charges.

 

“Some people will cuss me and say: ‘Man, parents do all they could,’ but when you examine it from a psychological point of view, and really look at it, you recognise that they didn’t do all they could. Some gave them everything they could, but that’s not really doing all you could.

 

“It’s an interest in a child’s development. It is giving up a lot of time to make sure that this child is doing what they should do. It isn’t sending the children to do homework; sometimes it’s helping the children do homework. It is ensuring that children get sufficient rest. In this age of technology, coming off the devices, because people claim that blue light doesn’t let you sleep. So if you’re looking at all these things morning, noon and night, you ain’t going to get no rest. So it is time to take it away from them. Don’t give it to them so they won’t bother even more. Children are supposed to bother you!”

 

He stressed that a child should be taught how to resolve conflict first within the home and then at school, and urged caregivers to exercise caution in the advice they give.

 

“I always took a serious position to people saying, ‘Don’t take that’. I’m not saying that people need to accept nonsense all the time, but when you teach your children that they must never take anything that they believe is unfair, then they can’t exist in this world, because when they go into the work setting, the boss tell them something that’s unfair they cuss and go along home, but then you’re without work, and on the block.”

 

The prosecutor was making sentencing submissions as to what Tyreke Benskin should receive for the stabbing death of 22-year-old Shakeem Holder on February 2, 2020. The killer was aged 17 at the time.

 

Benskin, of Promenade Road, Bush Hall, pleaded guilty to the murder in the No 4 Supreme Court at an earlier session of the Assizes.

 

Seale set a starting point of 35 years and highlighted troubling issues in Benskin’s pre-sentence and psychological reports, stating that people had seen him with knives from an early age, with one report outlining that he used to stab a punching bag in the neighbourhood, but there appeared to have been no early intervention.

 

The acting DPP said: “He liked knives. Nobody saw that as something troubling? [He said:] ‘I gine kill somebody before I reach 18.’ Nobody saw anything troubling with that? Man, we all to blame. We are all to blame.”

 

“If you are seeing this child with this type of propensity, there may be help above what you can give. That is when you seek the professionals,” Seale said, suggesting that guidance counselors, psychologists and psychiatrists could give assistance.

 

“We are open to all of these things in the Ministry of Education and people seem not to be availing themselves of it, and then at the end of the day they blame government. What more are we supposed to do? When will you get up and do something for yourself? When are you going to look after your own children?”

 

In Benskin’s favour, Seale noted there had been no planning or premeditation to the offence, that the convicted man had no previous convictions, had expressed remorse, and was aged 17 at the time.

 

Benskin was represented by King’s Counsel Andrew Pilgrim, who said that at the time of the offence, his client had been a “significantly troubled youth” with a propensity to act out.

 

Outlining similar aggravating and mitigating factors, he said courts took into account the view that people aged 16 to 19 are not yet fully developed mentally.

 

Insisting that there had been a change in Benskin’s behaviour over the past two years – having learnt to read and write – the defence attorney argued that this demonstrated he was capable of rehabilitation and suggested a starting range of 15 to 20 years.

 

He urged that any sentence should include an order that the 22-year-old undergo a rehabilitation plan that would include anger management and educational and vocational training.

 

The convicted man also admitted that on September 21, 2023, he escaped from Dodds Prison while on remand for the murder charge.

 

Lawyers on both sides agreed that any sentence for Benskin’s escape should run concurrently with that of the murder conviction.

 

Benskin told the court: “I was around a lot of negativity and anger. I was lost for a good little while and was not really focused and did not have any plans. I came jail and got into fights. I would call my mother and she was always crying. I tell myself I was not happy with how I was behaving, and I was not comfortable in my skin. I tell myself I have to mek a change and let go of a lot of things in the past that bothered me. I start to see a good future in myself… I just want to say how sorry I is. I do something that I cannot change. I tek a life that I cannot give back. I would like to apologise to the deceased’s parents… I just pray one day that they forgive me.”

 

Justice Laurie-Ann Smith-Bovell will pass sentence on February 27.

jeniquebelgrave@barbadostoday.bb