Attorney-at-law Sean Kinghorn yesterday shed tears as he made a final impassioned plea for his client Latoya Wilks, the former line cook charged with the 2012 murder of 40-year-old Italian chef Paolo Avigliano, to walk free.

Addressing the jury of four men and three women in the Supreme Court, Kinghorn disputed the prosecution’s insistence that Wilks was a “cool and deadly” murderess who had calmly and intentionally plunged a 10-inch-blade chef’s knife into the neck of the Italian in the kitchen of Caffé Da Vinci at Market Place in St Andrew.

The attorney argued that his client had tried to help the chef by using a towel to staunch the flow of his blood.

“That is not a person who is cool and deadly, that is a little girl confronted by a mad man who left her no choice. Latoya and I have been in this matter for eight years… eight long years, I’m happy it’s over. Break her chains today,” Kinghorn urged the jury with tears streaming down his face.

According to the evidence before the court, inclusive of footage of the incident obtained from the cameras at the restaurant, Avigliano — on the night in question, after accidentally splashing Wilks with hot oil — had refused to apologise and labelled her a bitch when pressed to say he was sorry.

The accused had also told the court that the situation escalated after she reported Avigliano to the restaurant manager at the time, resulting in him telling her, “you (expletive deleted) bitch, informer muss dead… you are an expletive informer”.

She said the chef further told her “Yuh (expletive deleted) black bitch; mi a go get rid a yuh tiddeh” and also threatened to take up a skillet that was nearby to douse her with hot oil.

According to Wilks, in the lead-up to the fatal moment, Avigliano — who had exited the kitchen — re-entered in a fit of rage, took up an eight-inch knife off the table and threatened to throw it at her. In moving away to report him again, the fatal altercation took place, she said.

But Kinghorn maintained that his client had only done what she did in order to preserve her life.

“Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being. Can you then actually have a lawful killing? Our law recognises that a person is entitled to use such force, as is reasonable, in the circumstances, to defend ourselves. There are going to be situations where it’s either your life or mine, and it’s not an easy thing,” he told jurors.

“The victim is of the view that he is going to kill her, does she have the right to stop him? The law says yes, even if it as gruesome as we have seen on the video. Because somebody has died doesn’t mean somebody is guilty of murder. Murder is the unlawful killing of somebody. Self-defence says a person may use such force as he determines necessary to defend himself or another,” Kinghorn said.

According to the attorney, the chef had engineered his own demise.

“When you look at the entire episode, this man Paolo, is it that he created a scenario which was such that he caused his own death? Did he continue this tantrum until the only thing that could stop him was a fatal blow? When you look at the videos, tell me when did you see Paolo stop? The prosecution showed that Miss Wilks took up a knife; this man sees her with the knife and still goes at her. You want to tell me it is not he who caused his own death?” he asked rhetorically.

Referencing the three instances in the video in which Avigliano is shown aggressively confronting Wilks, Kinghorn said, “…Yuh si mi teck up a knife and stand up and yuh still attack mi? What do you expect mi to do? That spirit of self-preservation would have kicked in — and there’s nothing unlawful or illegal about this.”

The attorney further quoted the then manager of the restaurant — who was called as a witness for the Crown — in a statement to the court in respect of Wilks, saying “she was one of my best employees, she worked with me for more than a year and I saw her everyday”.

“Latoya Wilks is a good, upstanding Jamaican citizen. She’s working and going to school; you think that is a person who has time to commit crime? Nothing bad has been said about Latoya. For Paolo, the first thing I found remarkable is what his common-law wife said about him: he is kind, sweet, but short-tempered; whenever he gets upset he would break stuff, including his own fingers, he would punch walls,” the attorney juxtaposed.

“God blessed me with three lovely girls and when I read that, I thought, my God, if one of my daughters told me the man she is going to marry is short-tempered like this, you would have to try me. A man who is going to take his hand and punch a wall is a dangerous, vicious character,” he added.

He further dismissed arguments that the Italian was not aware of the meaning of the inflammatory words he used that night.

“His girlfriend said he travelled all over the world and speaks several languages… I don’t want anybody to think he doesn’t understand the language… when a man defames, insults, belittles, and taints a woman by calling her a bitch, do not ignore that. There is a particular reason a man calls a woman a bitch — he has stopped respecting her as a person,” Kinghorn argued.

Noting that one worker had referred to Avigliano as becoming enraged before and throwing items around the kitchen, Kinghorn said “something should have been done about a person like this”.

Countering the prosecution’s insistence that Wilks — before making the fatal stab — had “charged” towards Avigliano and not away from him to make another complaint to her boss, Kinghorn said “there is no law that says if you are being attacked yuh fi run”.

Furthermore, he said, what was captured of Wilks was not of a woman intent on murdering, but a woman intent on warding off a violent man who had taken off his apron before returning to the kitchen that last time to accost Wilks.

“If he’s coming back to the kitchen to cook, where is his apron? He is not coming back to cook, a war this man come to war… she leaves the counter, takes up the knife and stops, that is a defensive stance. How somebody a go murder somebody and take up a weapon and stop? But he doesn’t stop; the only time I see Paolo stop is when he got the stab,” he pointed out.

Yesterday, trial Judge Justice Vivene Harris, in beginning her summation which will conclude today, said, “A lot of the evidence in this case is not in dispute. In fact, the Crown’s case and the defence’s case is almost side by side.”

She reminded jurors that their decision could not be based on sympathy to any of the individuals involved or particular prejudices, but rather on the legal points raised in order to determine whether what occurred was murder, self-defence or manslaughter.

“Your decision must be based on the evidence only,” Justice Harris instructed.

The jury will retire to consider its verdict after Justice Harris completes her summation this morning. In the meantime Wilks, who has been out on bail since 2012, was remanded overnight.