Murder convicts Everton “Beachy Stout” McDonald and Oscar Barnes will have to wait until September 19 before their sentences are handed down for the July 20, 2020 murder of McDonald’s wife Tonia.

On March 6 McDonald and Barnes were found guilty of Tonia’s brutal slaying which occurred on the main road in Sherwood Forest, Portland. Her body was found with multiple stab wounds and her throat slashed. The Toyota Axio motor vehicle she was driving was set on fire by Barnes. Tonia was also set on fire.

In the Home Circuit Court on Thursday, Judge Leighton Pusey, who was sitting in for Justice Chester Stamp, ordered that McDonald and Barnes be fingerprinted and that an antecedent report be prepared.

“Mr Barnes and Mr McDonald, please give your fingerprints to the police. Gentlemen, my brother judge, who is the person who needs to sentence you, because he tried the case, is unavailable for particular reasons at this time. The antecedent report is to be done,” Pusey said.

McDonald was said to have offered $3 million to a man by the name of Denvalyn “Bubbla” Minott to have his wife murdered. However, Minott, who became a key witness in the trial, said that he was incapable of stabbing the woman to death as instructed by McDonald, so he hired Barnes to do the job.

According to Minott, Barnes followed through and carried out the actual killing while he watched.

Minott was initially handed a 19-year prison sentence, but got it significantly reduced after agreeing to testify against McDonald and Barnes.

Minott said he first spoke to McDonald one day in 2020 when he went to visit the businessman at one of his stores in Portland. He said he had gone in search of a job at McDonald’s businessplace, but instead of putting him to work in the store or as a handyman to offload goods from delivery trucks, McDonald offered him $3 million to kill Tonia.

He said he got specific instructions that she was not to be shot. Instead McDonald wanted her to be stabbed and her throat cut. However, Minott said he couldn’t carry out the act himself, therefore he subcontracted it to Barnes whom he met on a fishing beach in Manchioneal, Portland.

Minott said he and Barnes made numerous attempts to kill Tonia at the house she shared with McDonald in Dolphin Bay, Portland. However, McDonald ordered that the murder take place somewhere else as he was worried that neighbours and others could possibly have become suspicious.

Tonia was lured to her death by Minott, who had tricked her that he was taking her to pick up two illegal firearms that she requested because she allegedly wanted to kill the man who murdered her father.