‘Guns are for cowards’ judge tells convicted man
Dame Linda Dobbs
(CNS): Justice Dame Linda Dobbs told Jonathan Welcome that guns are for cowards, as she handed down a six-year jail term Thursday. The 23-year-old Bodden Town man was convicted of possession of an imitation firearm with intent to resist arrest by a jury Wednesday and was sentenced today. With what she described as an “unenviable” rap sheet and his criminality escalating, the judge warned Welcome that he had to turn his life around.
“You are on a slippery slope downhill,” Justice Dobbs told Welcome, as she advised him to think long and hard about his future. “Because you don’t want to spend the rest of your life in prison, do you?” she asked, to which he replied, “No, ma’am.”
She told him that he was not being a man by carrying a firearm because only “cowards carry guns”. The judge said that strength lay in making the harder decision to disassociate from the people he had fallen into a life of crime with.
The court heard that although Welcome, who is Caymanian, came from a supportive and very religious family, they were extremely disappointed with his lifestyle choices. Welcome was said to have fallen into unsavoury company after he began smoking ganja as a teenager and then dropped out of school.
The judge raised her concerns that gun crime is the scourge of the Caribbean and she was well aware that the Cayman Islands has not escaped the trend, as it was becoming a serious problem.
She pointed out that had the charge against Welcome been for a real weapon, he would have been facing a mandatory ten-year term. The gun was never recovered but the fact that it was considered an imitation weapon did not make the case any less serious, she said, because it was not only police officers who had been threatened during the chase; Welcome had also pointed the gun at members of the public, who must have been petrified.
Although Welcome had been sentenced to six years in jail for his part in the robbery at Blackbeard’s in Grand Harbour, where members of the public intervened to apprehend him and his fellow robber, he was let out of jail after serving around three years on early release with no parole or supervision, the court heard.
Spoken by some moron who has (probably) never had a gun stuck in their face by a lunatic criminal who didn’t give a **** about who he had to hurt or kill to get what he wanted.
I’d rather be a live coward than a dead hero.
Go ahead, make my day!
You can die with honor and come back but once honor is lost it never comes back
We need the 3 strikes you are out law !! Lock them up for 25 years! I read a while back a guy had 59 convictions!! Are you kidding me! Serial burglary criminal and gets 6 months only to get out and break into another home of hard working people. We need to get this scum off the streets for good.we should make a deal with Jamaica and pay them to take the “bad boys” and incarcerate them there. We would save money . That is where they went years ago and they were crying all the way. Was a great diterant for crime. 59 convictions?? WTF
Six years for an imitation gun, 31/2 months for killing an innocent man and leaving him to die – can this really be the same judge?.
While I certainly agree that the 3 1/2 month sentence is shocking, there is a vast difference between intent (possesion of an illegal firearm & ammunition) and making a poor decision in the afternath of an accident.
It is however highly offensive to imply that the victim was ‘innocent’ … do your homework.
Guns are for soldiers and criminals. Take your pick. Very weak judge.
I like guns for shooting at the gun range…. I even like some cops to have guns.
6 years in jail for possession of an imitation firearm, 8 months out of jail with an electronic tag for killing someone in a cowardly hit and run?.
Where can I get a swatch of that carpet?
Guns are for cowards……. choose a car instead! No law against possession and literally, the best way to kill a local on the island and avoid jail. Just need to make sure though you don’t injure a tourist, because that could get you a few years.
So, let’s get this straight. In 2011 this creep was sentenced to 6 years for armed robbery, yet he has long since been released and continued to roam the streets with a firearm and commit crimes. Then he gets another 6 year sentence?
He’ll probably serve another couple years of this six year sentence and be out terrorizing again. Within the six years that he’s supposed to serve this time, I bet he’ll be released and involved in more gun crime. Just a matter of time before he takes a life. Is that what the Court is waiting on in order to lose this asshole in prison??!!
Then why do the police carry them?
Dufus, would you take a knife to a gun fight?
Imitation Firearm? He’s damn lucky. In some countries, he would be a corpse now for pulling a weapon on Police
In some countries black is enough to be shot.
I would’nt engage in such stupidity to begin with moron.
There is a difference my poor native…. one is to commit a crime/break laws & the other is enforcement/protect life and property . Little difference here. ok Bo Bo
Theres no difference according to the judge who states guns are for cowards. This must also include soldiers and law enforcement.
Shooting a man in the back is a cowardly move but carrying a fire arm for self defense or to enforce the law should not be seen as cowardly. There are plenty of brave men and women who own guns who are not civil servants. Best to be more discreet when implying “guns are for cowards”. Comprende gringo?
Says the rich non native who could not make it in his own country….
Getting along great even while surrounded by clowns like yourself.
what a foolish comment. please ignore this angry xenophobic person. he or she does not represent these islands and I am positive offers no value to the economy or social structure.
I can only hope you do not have children to pass this destructive logic on to