Seon Adams, the driver charged with the hit and run that claimed the life of a roadside fisher, has been sentenced to four years in jail after being found guilty of the crime.
Adams, 23, of Lot 355 La Parfaite Harmonie, had been charged with driving a car in a dangerous manner along the Blygezight Railway Embankment, thereby causing the death of 31-year-old Fizul Houssein on May 26th, last year.
Adams also faced three other charges: failure to report the accident within 24 hours; failure to render assistance to the injured Houssein; and failure to stop the vehicle, HC 2231, following the accident.
Adams had pleaded not guilty to the charges.
After a lengthy trial, Magistrate Judy Latchman found that a prima facie case had been established and called upon the accused to lead his defence.
Adams, who opted to give an unsworn testimony from the prisoners’ dock, related that he did not have much to say but explained that contrary to what was said in court, he did report the accident to the Brickdam Police Station.
“Some of the things presented through the trial was false,” he added.
Nevertheless, Magis-trate Latchman found Adams guilty of the offence and handed down a sentence of 50 months in jail on the causing death charge. The young man was also fined $30,000 on each of the three additional charges.
The police’s case was that Adams was driving along the embankment at a very fast rate and hit Houssein, who had been fishing while standing on a parapet. Instead of stopping, Adams was accused of driving off following the impact. Attorney Lennox Hanoman, who represented Adams at the time, explained that he did not understand how, at 4am, a man could be fishing. Nevertheless, he said, his client had indeed been driving and had heard a sound and stopped. However, he saw nothing and drove off.
Houssein’s uncle, Kamalelvin Houssein, who was with the deceased at the time of the incident, had said he was casting his net in a trench when he heard a loud thud behind him. Fizul, who had been sitting on a nearby bucket, was nowhere to be seen, the uncle said. However, a “whitish” car was seen speeding away from the scene while the bucket lay shattered.
The man said he suspected that his nephew had been struck by the car but could not locate where the body had landed after being hit. Houssein’s body was discovered shortly afterwards, submerged in the very trench he had been fishing in. He was later announced dead on arrival at the Georgetown Public Hospital.
