The Tribune

By LAMECH JOHNSON

Tribune Staff Reporter

ljohnson@tribunemedia.net

A NEW sentencing date has been set in December for a man convicted of the double murder of an elderly woman and her grandson during a home invasion.

Basil Gordon, 37, appeared before Senior Justice Stephen Isaacs yesterday for his expected sentencing hearing concerning the June 16, 2002 murders of Rosynell Newbold and her grandson, Kevin Wilson.

However, the matter could not proceed due to a miscommunication between the registrar of the Supreme Court and the recently appointed law firm of Lennox Coleby, where his associates were informed that the sentencing was scheduled for November 30 before Justice Carolita Bethell who held a status hearing for the matter on Senior Justice Stephen Isaacs’ behalf when he was on leave in August.

However, Senior Justice Isaacs explained that this was not the case as he presided over the trial and will preside over sentencing as well.

Prosecutor Viola Barnett said that the sentencing could not proceed in any event as the court was not yet in possession of the ordered psychiatric report the Crown had just received.

Gordon now faces sentencing on December 2.

A jury, on June 12, unanimously convicted Gordon of double murder and burglary.

The Crown’s case was that Gordon broke into a Pinewood Gardens home on June 16, 2002 and fatally stabbed Newbold and Wilson. The victims were the grandmother and brother of his ex-love interest.

Gordon denied the crimes during an interview with police, claiming that he was at a pool hall when the murders occurred. His alibi was investigated and while a worker at the pool hall said a man named Basil was there, she was unable to say if it was the same person as the accused.

Gordon was linked to the crime scene through DNA after police detectives sent off blood swabs collected outside the home and the accused’s blood for forensic analysis.