WHITE PLAINS, New York (AP) — A taxi driver, who was talked into returning from Jamaica to face charges of killing his girlfriend, has been sentenced to 18 years to life for murder.

Rohan Myers, 30, apologised to relatives of the victim, Christine Ferguson, before being sentenced Monday in Westchester County Court.

“From my heart, I’m really sorry,” he said.

But County Judge Lester Adler told Myers: “You have remorse for one person and one person only — yourself.”

Myers was convicted of second-degree murder in December when a jury rejected his claim that a handgun went off accidentally after he yanked it away from Christine Ferguson, 26, in the apartment they shared in Mount Vernon on August 1, 1998.

Myers fled right after the shooting, but three detectives, unarmed and without a warrant, tracked him to Jamaica, got him to talk about the killing on videotape and persuaded him to return with them to New York. He was arrested when their plane landed at New York’s John F Kennedy International Airport.