Woman admits killing partner after ‘move on’ message says prosecutor

After Devitus Chase told her that he had met someone else and advised her to move on, Shaniqua Kadeesha Cecilia Clarke devised a plan to kill him, a prosecutor told the No. 4 Supreme Court on Friday.

Last month, Clarke, of Helstone Lane, Gall Hill, Christ Church, confessed to murdering Chase between October 18 and 21, 2022. She was 27 at the time.

Reading the facts into evidence on Friday, Principal State Counsel Rudolph Burnett said that the two met in their neighbourhood in 2018 and became involved in a relationship with several ups and downs, as, in March 2022, they ended up before the court due to Chase wounding her. They rekindled the relationship a few months later.

The prosecutor said that Clarke became involved with another man and told him about Chase, but did not inform Chase of her other relationship. Chase later informed her that he had met someone else and told her to move on with her life, which infuriated her, as it appeared she wanted both men in her life, Burnett stated.

“The now convicted woman devised a plan to kill the deceased. In June 2022, the other person and the deceased met in Gall Hill, in close proximity to the now convicted woman when the other person visited her. There was an exchange of words between the two men. The now convicted womaninvited the deceased to Welches Beach where she planned to kill him so that he could not be with (the woman),” the prosecutor outlined.

On October 20, that same year, Chase’s mother went to Oistins Police Station to report him missing after his cousin reported that he had not attended work. The next day, police received an anonymous call about a body on Welches Beach. A relative who found Chase’s cell phone at home saw WhatsApp messages indicating that Clarke was the last person he had spoken to.

In her witness statement to police, the now convicted woman initially denied knowing anything about Chase’s death, but later said that she had reached out to him the day before the incident, and he agreed to meet her to talk. She called ‘x’ and told him, and ‘x’ expressed doubts about accompanying her, but she convinced him, “as nothing was supposed to happen.”

She said that ‘x’ was to have been in the area hiding before she and the deceased arrived.

In the record, the now convicted woman described that ‘x’ ran up as she and the deceased were sitting on the sand and began hitting him with a stick about the head before placing him in a headlock, and she “panicked” and stabbed Chase with a knife he carried for protection. “I do not recall the amount of times I stab him. I dropped the knife. I said to ‘x’, ‘This crazy.

This was not supposed to happen. You promised he wouldn’t die. He was bleeding and not moving. This is all my fault,” the statement read.

The convicted woman said the other person pulled the body into some nearby shrubs and threw the stick into a bushy area, and she placed the knife in a bag.

Defence attorney Sade Harris, who represents Clarke, accepted the facts, and Justice Laurie-Ann Smith-Bovell adjourned the case until April 17, when sentencing submissions will be heard.