JAMAICA’S Court of Appeal yesterday reserved judgement in the case brought by Peter Dugal, the Vineyard Town, Kingston resident who was sentenced to hang for the 2005 murder of businessman LG Brown and his lady friend Sandra Campbell.

Before the court’s decision, Director of Public Prosecutions Paula Llewellyn said that legislators should abolish the death penalty as a way out of the current ‘intellectual morass’ regarding the circumstances under which the punishment should be applied.

“The only way out of this intellectual morass is for the legislator to do what the Privy Council wants them to do, which is to abolish the death penalty,” said Llewellyn.

Llewellyn’s statement was made even as she urged the Court of Appeal to uphold Dugal’s death sentence.

Llewellyn, who expressed frustration that it was still not clear cut when the death penalty should be imposed, despite several court rulings, said she had “agonised” in putting the Crown submission together.

Quoting the Moise and the Queen ruling, among others, Llewellyn said that based on the aggravating circumstances of the murder, the death penalty was fitting for Dugal.

The court reserved judgement following Llewellyn’s submission.

On Monday, the court heard arguments from Dugal’s lawyer, Dr Randolph Williams, who said that his client did not deserve the death penalty as the murders were not exceptionally rare, sadistic or the worst kind of killing, as outlined in the Trimmingham ruling.

Dugal was sentenced to death in November 2007 for the June 25, 2005 double murders at Campbell’s Stony Hill, St Andrew home. Brown is the former head of the Jamaica Gasoline Retailers Association.

Dugal’s co-accused, Donald Whyte, who was sentenced to life imprisonment and ordered to serve 40 years before being eligible for parole, was last week freed by the appellate court, which found that he was convicted on hearsay evidence.

In January last year, Sandra Watt, Campbell’s 45-year-old helper, was released after the Crown suspended the case against her due to insufficient evidence.

The appeal was heard by appellate court president Justice Seymour Panton and Justices Howard Cooke, Karl Harrison, Dennis Morrison and Hillary Phillips.