Ninja Man appeal hearing challenges life terms and eight-year case delay

The Court of Appeal hearing for dancehall artiste Desmond ‘Ninja Man’ Ballentine, his son and co-accused Janil Ballentine, and Dennis Clayton remains under way. The three were handed life imprisonment in 2017 after convictions linked to a 2009 murder and a shooting with intent.

Defence counsel today pressed the mental elements of the offences, asked whether the eight-year gap between the crime and sentencing was properly weighed when the terms were fixed, and questioned whether closeness to a firearm by itself proves intent to use it.

King’s Counsel told the court that Justice Gail imposed life on the applicants without first weighing every available sentencing option. Counsel further argued that neither the trial nor the sentence took account of the eight years that passed between the 2009 incident and the 2017 penalty, which the defence says breached the appellants’ rights and ought to have featured in the sentencing exercise.

Stuart Russell, of attorney Robert Fletcher’s defence team, accepted that murder involving guns often attracts life imprisonment, but insisted the usual starting point should not be the maximum. Life, he said, belongs only to the most extreme and grave cases.

He pointed to paragraph 76 of the relevant ruling, which sets out the kinds of circumstances serious enough to justify life. On the defence case, this matter falls outside those listed categories. Because the judge never explained why life was chosen, the team submits that the sentence was flawed.

Counsel also argued that a proper sentencing remarks should state the starting point, the aggravating and mitigating factors, and how any period already spent on remand was treated. At trial, the attorney said, the judge did not show how the three and a half years Valentine had already spent in custody were credited.

The defence maintains that the maximum term was too harsh and that a fixed sentence, with eligibility for parole after 10 years, would be the more appropriate outcome.