St Vincent man jailed for life after killing drinking partner

KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent, Mar 28, CMC – A High Court judge has sentenced  43-year, Kamara Lampkin, to life imprisonment after he was found guilty of murdering a badly beaten man to kneel before him with his hand and feet tied, and chopped him to death in 2018.

His co-accused, Phil Dover, 27, whose testimony helped to secure a murder conviction, will spend a further seven years in prison. He was given a 12 year jail term, one third of the full amount he would have had to serve had it not been for his guilty plea and evidence against Lampkin.

Justice Bryan Cottle ruled that Lampkin be brought back before the court after 30 years to see if he is sufficiently rehabilitated to be released.

If he is not rehabilitated — and in the absence of parole legislation — Lampkin’s case would be reviewed every three years.

Before being sentenced, Lampkin apologised to the family of his victim, Carson Warner, 27, “for what happened to Carson not because of me.

“I was there, so I have to tell them sorry,” Lampkin said, before his lawyer told him to say no more.

Lampkin was convicted after a full trial on the indictment that had charged him and Dover with Warner’s murder. However, Dover pleaded guilty to manslaughter and testified for the prosecution.

The court heard that on August  24, 2018, Warner, Dover, Lampkin and Dwayne Walker,  were drinking together at Campden Park, visting several bars before going to Walker’s home,  where they continued to drink.

There, a disagreement broke out and Lampkin and Dover set upon Warner and beat him badly.

They bound his arms and legs and wrapped him, bleeding, in a sheet and took him to another venue where he was chopped and his body tossed against the rocky foreshore below.

Warner died of his injuries and a forensic pathologist identified 19 such wounds.

Walker, along with Rawle Bowens, a 25-year-old mechanic, were also charged with murder, but as the preliminary inquiry began at the Serious Offences Court in February 2019, the prosecution withdrew the charge against Walker and Bowens , t who had spent six months in prison awaiting the start of the inquiry.

Lampkin,  a father of three denied culpability but expressed apology in court for the part he played in the killing, the judge said during the sentencing phase.

Lampkin left school at Senior 3 and worked as a labourer. His parents said he is a good boy and asked the court to show leniency.

Justice Cottle further said that in determining whether to impose a whole life sentence, the court also considered whether Lampkin is likely to commit further offences of serious violence and whether he is a substantial danger to the community.

The judge noted that Warner was chopped 19 times as he was forced to kneel before Lampkin.

Some of the chops were such that his skull was penetrated and his brain exposed.

He said that other people who were present at Walker’s home were threatened so that Lampkin could facilitate the commission of the offence.

Lampkin played a leading role, the court said, and noted that he left St. Vincent illegal in an attempt to avoid being charged.

In October 2019, Lampkin was deported from Grenada where he was facing drug trafficking and immigration charges, to face the murder charge in St. Vincent.

The judge said that Lampkin had no previous conviction, the only mitigating feature of the offender.

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