BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – JASON ‘PEEWEE’ LIDDIE of Haynes Smith Village, who was found guilty of rape, housebreaking and larceny, was on Monday (Apr. 8) sentenced to serve almost 26 years in jail.
According to a police communiqué, the 33-year-old man was sentenced to serve six years for housebreaking and larceny, and 19 years, 11 months and six days for rape after the time he spent on remand was deducted.
Both sentences are to run concurrently commencing from the date of sentence.
The offences were committed on Saturday, March 13, 2017 when he broke into the apartment of a university student, whom he raped and stole a number of personal items and cash from her.
He had appeared in the Basseterre High Court before Justice Trevor Warde Q.C on Monday, February 18, 2019 without a legal representative, while Director of Public Prosecutions Valston Graham headed the prosecution team along with Greatess Gordon and Lanien Blanchette.
On taking the stand, Liddie claimed that he was innocent and accused the police of planting his DNA at the scene.
In an effort to maintain his innocence, he had called on his mother, brother and the mother of his children, who all testified that he was at home at the time of the incident.
The Crown had called on the virtual complainant and two police officers to take the stand and the prosecutor had also presented to the Court DNA evidence from the rape incident.
It was pointed out in the Court that the police had taken saliva swabs from Liddie when he was arrested, and the DNA from those samples had matched the semen sample collected from the rape victim.
On returning to the Court on Friday, February 22, 2019, Justice Warde summed up the case and the jury took just over two hours of deliberation to return guilty verdicts on both charges.
