Prisoner acquitted of cutting fellow inmate with machete | THE DAILY HERALD

PHILIPSBURG–Prison inmate Kerby Degrammond was acquitted Thursday of cutting a fellow-inmate with a machete at Pointe Blanche prison during a fight on December 28, 2016. During the fight the victim was hit with a machete and sustained a wound to the back of his head.

Degrammond (22), who is currently sitting out a six-year sentence for aggravated theft, denied he had anything to do with the incident and denied the charges of severe bodily harm.

“I have nothing to do with the fight. I did not hit this guy. It is not true, but I was there when this incident happened in prison,” he told the Court via a video-connection with the prison in Zutphen.

He is currently detained at the prison of Nieuwegein, also in the Netherlands, and said he should not be sentenced “based on a wrap sheet.”

The victim, Brandon Alberto Dixin, (24) was sentenced by the Joint Court of Justice to four years for armed robberies committed at two Sol gas stations on November 30, 2015.

Dixin was attacked by a group of inmates with improvised weapons at the prison’s airing space in the vicinity of the facewash basins.

There were many witnesses to the incident. Several witnesses mentioned a “man in red pants” swinging a machete, but no one actually saw Degrammond dealing a blow to Dixin’s head. Video-surveillance images of the incident are no longer available, the defence lawyer said.

Dixin did not press for charges and also did not provide a statement but a police officer drew a report after he had a conversation with the injured inmate in which he told the officer that Degrammond had inflicted the cut to his head.

The Prosecutor found the crime of inflicting severe bodily harm proven, stating that the defendant already had a long list of violent crimes in his criminal record. He said that Degrammond should be punished with a ten-month prison sentence, as he wanted to give “the signal that arms do not belong in prison.”

Degrammond’s lawyer from the Netherlands pleaded for her client’s acquittal as she said there was no evidence that her client had hit the victim with a machete, adding that the possession of a cutlass was not mentioned in the indictment.

According to the lawyer, Dixin was not stabbed by her client, but by another inmate. Her client had also not contributed to the stabbing, she said.

“You certainly have the appearance against you,” the Judge said, but different scenarios of what had transpired were altogether possible, he added. The Judge said it was clear that another inmate had been the most active in exerting violence.

“There are presumptions against you, but these do not meet the threshold of legal and convincing evidence,” said the Judge, who also found co-perpetration not proven.

Source: The Daily Herald https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/80142-prisoner-acquitted-of-cutting-fellow-inmate-with-machete

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