JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Tuesday, July 22, 2025

Have mercy on my son

by

20131211

The moth­er of con­vict­ed mur­der­er Lester Pit­man yes­ter­day plead­ed with Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie to have "mer­cy" on her son, who has been be­hind bars for 12 years await­ing fi­nal jus­tice.A pe­tit 52-year-old Cheryl Pit­man, of Up­per Bushe Street, San Juan, said her third son, who turned 34 in Au­gust, had the in­tel­li­gence of a child and had no in­ten­tion of oust­ing the Chief Jus­tice from of­fice when he took the un­prece­dent­ed step to ini­ti­ate le­gal ac­tion which threat­ened to im­peach Archie to get judg­ment in his case.

"I just want the Chief Jus­tice to have a lit­tle mer­cy," she said in an in­ter­view at Guardian Me­dia Lim­it­ed's St Vin­cent Street, Port-of-Spain, of­fices.Pit­man, a hair­dress­er and moth­er of six, said her son was "suf­fer­ing due to the de­lay."She said it was the frus­tra­tion over the de­lay which had dri­ven him to es­cape from death row at the Fred­er­ick Street prison on De­cem­ber 9, 2012.

The con­vict's dash for free­dom was short-lived, how­ev­er, as he was held by pris­ons of­fi­cers a short dis­tance from the jail. His moth­er claimed that her son's left an­kle and nose were bro­ken af­ter he was cap­tured.

On June 8, 2005, the death war­rant was read to him and the hang­man stood ready for the ex­e­cu­tion, but the process was re­scind­ed af­ter it was dis­cov­ered there was a pend­ing ap­peal be­fore the Privy Coun­cil in Lon­don. It was lat­er re­vealed that Nor­ton Jack, now a High Court judge, had er­ro­neous­ly ad­vised then at­tor­ney gen­er­al John Je­re­mie that Pit­man had no pend­ing ap­peal.

"When they read the death war­rant I was in a state of shock," Pit­man said yes­ter­day, adding, how­ev­er, that she re­lied then and con­tin­ues to trust "in my faith in God" to do some­thing good for her son.Asked whether she thinks so­ci­ety could have any sym­pa­thy for her son, who was con­vict­ed of the bru­tal killing of three peo­ple, she re­spond­ed, "I know that is the ques­tion peo­ple would be ask­ing. I can't an­swer that."

Killer with child's IQ

Pit­man was con­vict­ed in 2004 of the Cas­cade triple mur­ders.John Crop­per, 59, his moth­er-in-law Mag­gie Lee, 68, and sis­ter-in-law Lynette Lith­gow-Pear­son, 57, were found dead by po­lice on De­cem­ber 13, 2001, and the Ap­peal Court re­served its de­ci­sion in his case in No­vem­ber 2009."What­ev­er the judg­ment is I would ac­cept, but I hope for the best. This is not a move to get the Chief Jus­tice out of of­fice. Peo­ple should have mer­cy for Lester be­cause his IQ is very low. He thinks like a child."

The Privy Coun­cil re­mit­ted Pit­man's ap­peal to the lo­cal Ap­peal Court in 2010 to in­ves­ti­gate the safe­ty of his con­vic­tion, based on new ev­i­dence sur­round­ing his men­tal ca­pac­i­ty. The rul­ing not­ed that Pit­man's in­tel­lect war­rants a "prop­er in­ves­ti­ga­tion," since the con­vic­tion is "po­ten­tial­ly un­safe and re­quires a re­view" in light of new foren­sic re­ports.

Yes­ter­day, Pit­man said when her son was just about three years old, he fell over a wall in her yard and hit his head. The in­jury was so se­vere he had to wear a body cast as he re­cu­per­at­ed from the head and neck in­jury. Doc­tors then di­ag­nosed him with a per­ma­nent brain in­jury and told his moth­er he would be a slow learn­er.

Pit­man said her son failed the then Com­mon En­trance ex­am at the San Juan Boys' RC School and did odd jobs around the vil­lage to earn a liv­ing."My hope is to see him come out and live a nor­mal life and turn to God," the sin­gle moth­er said.Pit­man, through his team of at­tor­neys, filed a pre-ac­tion pro­to­col let­ter on No­vem­ber 25, claim­ing that his con­sti­tu­tion­al rights were be­ing in­fringed by the three-year-and-nine-month de­lay by the Ap­peal Court to give its de­ci­sion in his case.

Archie, along with Jus­tice of Ap­peal Paula Mae Weekes and Al­ice Yorke Soo-Hon, re­served their de­ci­sion in March 2010 and Pit­man's ac­tion has trig­gered an avalanche of com­plaints re­lat­ing to the slow pace of de­liv­ery of jus­tice.The Ap­peal Court is sched­uled to de­liv­er Pit­man's de­ci­sion next Wednes­day."Why this long de­lay? Usu­al­ly a judg­ment sup­posed to come out in less than a year, four years is too long," Cheryl Pit­man said.

"I just hope Mr Archie don't take this per­son­al­ly and hold it against him."In De­cem­ber 2009, Pit­man was award­ed $147,000 by the State for in­juries he sus­tained at the hands of pris­ons of­fi­cers in No­vem­ber 2008.

Pit­man yes­ter­day filed a Free­dom of In­for­ma­tion re­quest be­fore Reg­is­trar of the Supreme Court, Maris­sa Robert­son, seek­ing to get a list of all the out­stand­ing judg­ments from Archie and the dates up­on which they were re­served. An­oth­er FOI re­quest was made by at­tor­ney Naveen Maraj seek­ing a list of all the out­stand­ing judg­ments of the Ap­peal Court and the dates they were re­served.

Archie on Mon­day sum­moned the judges of the Supreme Court to a meet­ing at the Hall of Jus­tice, Port-of-Spain, where the is­sue of de­lays in de­liv­er­ing judg­ments was dis­cussed at length. Archie re­port­ed­ly told judges he be­lieved the cam­paign in the press against him was aimed at pres­sur­ing him out of of­fice.


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored