Lynch found guilty of murder, awaits his fate

Layou resident Kenute Lynch will learn his fate on March 23, pending a Social Inquiry report.{{more}}

After nearly two hours of deliberations, Lynch, 33, was found guilty on Friday, February 24, of the 2007 murder of Maxwell John, also of Layou.

John was shot in the back on the night of July 18, 2007, following an incident at Texier Road, Layou. He subsequently succumbed to his injuries at the Milton Cato Memorial Hospital October 16, 2007.

At the trial, heard before Justice Wesley James, Lynch testified that he was at his mother’s home in an area called plan, when John was shot.

When Lynch took the stand, he told the court that he was at his mother’s home when she told him that his brother Evans Lynch had been shot in Texier Road.

Fortunately, Evans survived a gunshot wound to his shoulder.

Another man, Rodel Hazelwood, was charged, concvicted and jailed in connection with Evans Lynch’s shooting.

Crown Counsel Colin John, under cross-examination, told Lynch that several persons saw him clad in army attire when he pulled a gun from his waist and shot John in his back where he was sitting on a wall at Texier Road.

“I am putting it to you that you put on your army clothes, put your gun in your waist and went up the road. You didn’t see Rodel when you went to Texier Road and when you saw his friend Maxwell, you pulled your gun from your waist and shot him in his back.”

Lynch replied: “No please”.

Some witnesses also testified that they saw Lynch walk up to John that night, shoot him and flee the scene.

However, Verina Lynch, Kenute’s mother, corroborated his story that he was at her home at the time of John’s shooting. She said she told Kenute not to go to Texier Road after what she had heard about Evans.

“He say ‘Tanty ah going up Texier Road’, and I told him not to go, and go and lay down on the ground, so I give him a sheet and he lay down ah ground…” Verina testified.

Lynch was represented by attorney Kay Bacchus-Browne.(KW)