Affection had long since dulled in a 27-year marriage, and the husband, seemingly frustrated after becoming a double amputee, sharpened his heavy silver handled knife for his wife last week.

This was the story that came out in the Kingstown Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday, when husband and wife gave their history in court.

In the late morning on Tuesday, Andrew Myers wheeled himself into the court room, charged that on May 26, in Buccament, he did unlawfully and maliciously wound his wife, Monique Myers, of Buccament.

The white haired man pleaded guilty to the charge, and the facts were read from the police’s perspective, as they were present when the wounding took place.

They indicated that they had received a call from the defendant, and he said that his wife and son were beating him. The police went to the house, and found that this was not so, but rather that there was a disagreement about car keys. After speaking to the arguing individuals, the police proceeded to leave.

As they were about to leave, they said they noticed the wife running towards them with an injury to her chest.

The wife told them that her husband had pulled a knife from his wheelchair when she was passing him, and had stabbed her with it.

The police wrestled the knife out of the husband’s hands, and he was arrested.

The wife was admitted to the hospital as a patient on the same day, and remained there until Monday, May 28.

Senior Magistrate Rickie Burnett asked the defendant what had caused him to behave the way he did.

“Me and she married for over 27 years now,” he began. He said, “She telling me she only my wife on paper…she say she ain love me, she ain love me no more.”
He said his wife had been “hurting [his] head”, since the year began.

He affirmed that he lost both legs to diabetes. One was removed earlier, but the other leg was lost in October, 2017.

“If she hurting up your head, there are certain things you can do, but you can’t stab her,” Senior Magistrate Rickie Burnett said.

Monique Myers was present in court, and when it came time for her to give her side, she spoke of her frustrations at length.

She stated that the relationship has always been an abusive one, to her and the children, and neither her family, nor the defendant’s, could understand why she stayed with him.

When he lost the first foot, she said his attitude seemed to be changing, and she told him “It’s a shame that it have to take a foot for you to start acting like this.”

However, when he lost the second foot, she said his attitude seemed to change for the worse again. She informed she had stayed with him in the hospital for three months.

The exasperated woman disclosed that he would throw her stuff out, and put the children out in the rain.

She claimed that he had attacked her before with a knife, and she had left the house after this, returning because it is her house too, and because of his condition. She felt that her husband really wanted to kill her.

“Stop tell lie,” her husband had shouted across the court room when his wife was telling this story.

On the day in question, the wife said that her spouse was angry at the son for going to sell fish, without taking him along. His anger apparently caused him to say he would kill his son, and to yell at him to give him his car keys.

At the moment she was stabbed, he was apparently lying in wait for her where he knew she would have to pass. When she saw him moving out of the corner of her eye, Monique Myers turned, and she said she pulled back as she was stabbed.

Her husband insisted that these were lies, and that “me nah go fuh kill her.” Demonstrating that if he was trying to kill her he would have gone about it differently.

“Let me remind you, she’s a human being,” Burnett told him.

It was noted that the wound received was 10cm deep, and that the knife, in the court as evidence, was sharp. The knife was a long, silver handled, heavy instrument.

Prosecutor Delroy Tittle offered his thoughts, saying “I am fearful for this lady’s life…I believe there would be further attacks.”

Defence Attorney Ronald Marks was also engaged, and he described the events as frightening. He stated that her reaction in pulling away, that, “I think that is the only thing that saved her life.” “That knife is really a deadly weapon,” he intoned.

Burnett handed down a sentence of four years of incarceration, with the words “Mr Myers, I have to inform you that this matter warrants a prison sentence, and that’s where you’re going.”

The defendant’s condition creates uncertainty for the police, used to prisoners with two legs. Therefore, on the way to the prison transport, the police officers had a momentary lapse in judgment and Myers took a fall out of his wheelchair (see video here: https://youtu.be/46k9XbzB1yY), when the wheels got hooked in a metal grid covering the gutter outside. (KR)