A Guyanese court handed down death sentences for two men found guilty of high seas piracy attacks that killed seven fishermen off the nation’s coast in 2018, and authorities said they have finally stopped a deadly group operating that preyed on fishermen for years.
Nakool Manohar, 45, and Premnauth Persaud, 48, were convicted of masterminding an attack on a group of fishing vessels in waters near the neighbouring shores of Suriname in a row over access to prime fishing grounds.
Besides the seven murdered fishermen, about a dozen others were rescued after drifting on the waters for days. Police said some of the dead men were thrown overboard with their hands tied or weighed down with boat batteries.
Others were reportedly chopped with machetes or burned with hot engine oil and tossed into the waters of the Atlantic Ocean.
Sentencing the men on Tuesday after a jury returned guilty verdicts, Justice Navindra Singh described the attacks as heinous, saying he found “no reason not to impose the death sentence.”
“It would be reckless and irresponsible of the court to allow them to be released into society at any time,” the judge said. He called their actions “gruesome, heinous and cold-blooded” as he imposed death by hanging.
The men can appeal the ruling to the local court of appeals and also to the Trinidad-based Caribbean Court of Justice, which is the final court for Guyana. Their lawyer declined to comment on their plans.
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