Judges take different views on gangster killers
Brian Borden
Devon Anglin
(CNS): Devon Anglin (32) and Brian Borden (30) both learned Friday the minimum time they will serve on their life sentences for murder. The two West Bay men were both members of the Birch Tree Hill gang but were involved in execution-style killings of rival gang members in two separate incidents. Anglin was given a 30-year term, in line with the time set out in the law for gunning down Carlos Webster in a crowded nightclub in 2009, while Borden was given 34 years for shooting Robert Mackford Bush in 2011.
Chief Justice Anthony Smellie, who heard Anglin’s case, said he did not find any “compelling reason to interfere with the statutory minimum” 30-year life tariff set out in the Conditional Release Law for murder.
He dismissed the idea that Anglin was humiliated and provoked and pointed out that the shooting in a crowded nightclub was a terrifying experience. However, he saw no evidence of pre-planning and the killing was set against the backdrop of the hostile gang rivalry, he found. The chief justice also noted that when Anglin was charged, he had persistently denied being the shooter, though in more recent times he has made admissions, telling doctors that the killing was motivated by betrayal and reprisal.
Meanwhile, Justice Alex Henderson handed a longer term to Borden, as he found that there was a considerable amount of pre-meditation in Borden’s determination to kill Bush. This and the gang-related issues surrounding the killing justified an increase in the minimum time he should serve before he becomes eligible for a parole hearing from the 30-year statutory starting point to 34 years.
In his ruling Justice Henderson said Borden had stalked his victim and made repeated assertions about wanting to kill him, which he said significantly aggravated the circumstances. But he also said the issue of Borden’s standing in the gang was another exceptionally aggravating factor that fuelled the murder.
He said that Bush’s constant incursions into the Birch Tree Hill territory, despite being a member of the rival Logwoods gang, to collect his girlfriend, who was living in the area, became a question of honour in gang protocol that could not be ignored.
“This was a murder committed by Mr Borden to enhance his standing with the Birch Tree Hill gang,” the judge said in his ruling. “He was regarded as its leader. He no doubt felt that to maintain his position and the esteem of his fellow gang members he had to act… He executed the victim in order that others might see him as someone to be feared and obeyed.”
Borden was one of two gunmen who killed Bush and was found to have shot his rival with a shotgun at close range while he sat in a car. At trial the second shooter was identified by a crown witness as Keith Montague, but while he was arrested and questioned, the West Bay man was never charged in this case.
Both men will be in their sixties by the time they serve their minimum term, but as lifers, there is no guarantee that they will be released even after they reach that point. The decision on whether or not they can be released on licence will be in the hands of the Conditional Release Board.
Carlo and Robbie were saints who sang in the church choir, knew nothing about drugs and were never even suspected of taking a peppermint from a wayside store, let alone a single murder.
You idiot! Nobody is saying they were innocent! They didn’t deserve to be killed in the manner in which they were! You are missing the point fool!
oh! I got it! It shouldn’t have happened to THEM that way!
Understood…really cute angle to view it from, I must say.
Caymanian history shows that the settlers of the country were European murderers (who continued to murder slaves at will) and buccaneers (retired murderers from piracy at sea) and the first murder trial held in this country was over a HORSE!
John Elmslie worked himself to death trying to build a church to help convert the population from its wicked ways – against great resistance and sabotage. Goodness was not wanted on this land. Your geneology is not very impressive.
Perhaps its time to get real, Cayman: you are the descendants of murderers. Stop killing your own in action and in words and start changing your historical path! Begin with empathy – a very hard perspective, but if you are better than those convicted you will search and work hard to begin to develop it.
Have any of you committed any wrongs lately? Or your children? I’m sure you haven’t and neither have your parents and grandparents. You’re all perfectly holy as far as I can read, although what I see is something quite different.
Sounds like you’re perfect teachers to lead the youth ahead to the destruction of each other, that’s for sure. You seem to have no way of civilly addressing your problem. You seem to be challenged on kindness and dispute resolution, but fully equipped as antagonists. Because of hatred your country’s future (your youth) is doomed, unless you make a turn-around in your view and approach to each other.
If you are parents, the views your children are subjected to are making them equally as hateful as you are. How are they learning to resolve issues? There seems some great challenges to that and you make that quite clear by using the opportunity to speak your thoughts “freely” as “Anonymous”.
Action is preceded by thoughts, words (then action). Have a good think of what has been said here alone and then think if there really is much difference between you and the convicts, but please especially consider if this is the type of person that you want your child to grow to become. They absorb what they see and hear, especially from their parents. (Side note: “anonymous” is not an indication of free speech, but it does give the outer world a look at what your true thoughts/mind-frame are. Free speech uses your name/face voice without fear of retribution. It is most often used for positive statements, to bring positive change and not hate speech).
I think it would be good for your nation if you started teaching and speaking love to your youth instead of words of hate and condemnation.
I didn’t share my thoughts with you hoping to get a lot of “thumbs up”, as a matter of fact I expect that my comment will get a lot of “thumbs down”, or none at all, because it’s outside all the norms of your society’s thinking patterns.
Your comments suggest that you are an expat who is here, doesn’t want to be here but the money must be good and it is better living here than your country of origin or else you would not be putting up with us Caymanians.. May I suggest that before you pluck the eye out of our problem that you look at your home country wherever that is and provide raw proof that there are no persons committing murders past, present of future therein.
You see its persons like you that create dissent in our community and expect us natives to just suck up to you. Back I the 70’s if you had made such statements in a public place you would not be living on the island for long after, now a days you are able to hide through this type of medium and we who have progressed will froth at the mouth wishing and hoping that we could get our hands on you (yes we can still become violent but not to pound you up but to introduce you to a good friend by the name of “Mr. Hurry”), a very quiet and simple fellow is he but oh he packs a wallop you don’t see but feel.
So dear one keep on with your written musings and don’t let anyone know who you really are for Mr. Hurry may catch up with you somewhere! One never knows do one!.
Your judgments and condemnation are all very wrong:
I am very much Caymanian. All of my bloodlines lie here. I, too, am the inheritor of the pirate bloodline too, the European massacring bloodline, the African bloodline. I am Caymanian. Very, very much so. Nothing in my post has indicated that I am not. You answered from a judgmental view.
However, I have choosen to separate myself from the ownership of a society that is condemning, hateful, judgmental; in your case, hateful and arrogant. Arrogant to the fact that even if I were by some chance a foreigner, my views would be dismissed and attacked as you have, based on one fact: a prejudice against foreigners. Another rampant hate in this country. Yet, they are the very source of slavery that is still maintained in this country. Caymanians refuse to work for $6 per hour – as they should – but employ and pay (when they do) Philippinos $3ph.
Bobo, I could tell you more stuff than you can imagine about Ms Victorine, Mr Sammy, Bud, Hal, Chester, Mr Athens, Mr Albert, Mr Leonard, Mr Arthur, Mr. Eggbert, Ms. Vyonnie, Ms Doris and even Long Celia; the Cimboco and the Antaris; I plait thatch for my mother up until today when she gets tired; I cook conch stew and turtle meat at least twice per month too and my cassava cake none a unnah can touch.
And I know my history. It is no longer offensive to me. Painful, yes. But no longer offensive. Your threats to me today won’t change the past events that have happened in this country; but they are proof of the murderous mentality living on.
I encouraged responsibility in child rearing and loving one another. Moving away from past wrongs and towards future rights.
You came back with a threat of physical harm….because you think that I am a foreigner. Apparently (an acknowledgement of judgment), what I said was right as you’re not challenging the content as much as you are challenging the author, but you want to beat me with a “cowcod” – because you believe that I am a foreigner. Isn’t that hateful?
I preach “love your neighbour as yourself and train up your child in the way they should go”. You preach “hate everyone that doesn’t see things the way you do and kill the foreigner”.
But yet, you want to be the one to pass judgment of how the guilty in this country should be ajudged. Maybe you should, and that being done by example.
Look at your post, brother. Look at the hatred and violence you spew. Are you happy to be viewed as a Caymanian like that? And that Caymanians should be viewed internationally like that? Is this what the “friendly people” are all about?
If you are concluding that “your nation” makes me a foreigner, please stop assuming on the wrong things. “Your nation” was giving you ownership of the country in a hope to create some thoughts in you about what is yours and how you are managing it.
I’ll keep the title of “Caymanian” and make anonymous posts on CNS because of fear of retribution – like yours (yet you want to talk about the culture of silence in the gang world, when you yourself, supposedly “betta dan dem”, cause, create and fuel it, even in cyberspace with vicious responses such as you have made).
“Back in the 70’s” we were all so caught up in making a dollar at Holiday Inn, Galleon Beach, Royal Palms and Spanish Bay Reef Hotel that we didn’t have time to fight down our fellow Caymanians as we do now; we didn’t even know prejudice when we heard it.
Back in the 70’s people had morals and we shared whatever we had. Back in the 70’s people stood responsibility for other’s children. We were a people. That’s what back in the 70’s were.
Jah Dread, please become a motivator towards the youth in positive problem solving and not one of violence. Cayman doesn’t need anymore violence. I’m sure we can agree on that point.
If the expat work force was pulled out of this country our economy would collapse. Accept it. Stop hating.
Oh, and last thing: I am self-employed.
Yow I am not your Bobo, your cousin or any relationship. Call me judgmental and hater a dat your prerogative Bredren. The fact is that I hit a nerve didn’t I?. Mr .Hurry is no respecter of persons Iah! scene! Take it whatever way you want to take it youth.
” I am Caymanian. Very, very much so. Nothing in my post has indicated that I am not”
Actually in the first post you said “I think it would be good for your nation if……..”. That indicates you are not one of the nation you are describing.
Strange thing to say if you a really are a son of the soil.
Jah, you get our pain. There is reason expats have to be paid so much extra to put up with working in the Caymans.
If only posting photographs looking like a tool was a basis for locking them up before they did these things. It is hardly Minority Report, but it would work in many cases.
Anonymous @ 10:44am, “When parents fail, the Government needs to intervene”??????
Are you serious?
How about 12 and 13 year olds stop becoming sexually active from a way too young age and having babies at 14, 15 and 16 years old.
That is what is wrong with this society now, people want the Government to be responsible for everything.
When children don’t finish high school, make no effort to improve themselves education-wise, get low paying jobs that can barely sustain themselves then make the deliberate decision to have children to add to that already disastrous equation and you think the Government can intervene?
Intervene to do what?
History has shown that the parents who “fail” using your reference, instead of learning from situations, they repeat them.
They sign up for social services or their kid is taken into foster care and what do they do? Go and have more kids!!!
At what point do you think the Government should determine that the parent has “failed” and intervene?
When the child starts misbehaving in school?
When the child starts skipping school?
What happens when the child has “graduated” from school and just doesn’t get a job or do anything productive, you think the Government can intervene then?
Can the Government monitor every moment of the child?
Further Education has recently started some sort of program which attempts to keep girls who got pregnant, in school, how about we start teaching primary school age kids the consequences of becoming sexually active at a young age.
Getting pregnant is just one consequence, and is not the worst thing that can happen.
They can contract sexual transmitted diseases, some that can be fatal.
Why don’t we teach our young men about responsibilities and not having sex just for fun or to prove that they are cool and if they do get a girl pregnant, step up to the plate, be a man and take care of the child. Not impregnate 4 other girls.
Delinquency can most times be traced back to single parent homes. I am not saying you don’t have delinquent children that come from two-parent homes but if you look at the statistics you will see that the majority of them are from single or broken homes.There are also children who were raised in single parent homes, who have become productive members of society but they are rare.
Just wildly suggesting that the Government intervene without any specifics is not helpful, just a good way to deflect from the real root of the problem…..babies having babies and fathers or mothers abandoning families.
Well said! If you want meaningful government intervention, change the laws to allow for abortions.
I’m not giving these young men credit for the crimes they have committed and will continue to commit, however one must consider that the failures of our country as a whole has greatly contributed to this behavior. Most of these kids come from broken homes where no one truly cares, and the government simply turns a blind eye. When parents fail, the government needs to intervene from a very young age to help these young people. The fact is if nothing changes we might not be here in ten years to discuss these issues as we may also become victims.
Have a nice day!
Yes because the Government is the answer for all solutions right?! GTFOH with that nonsense. These punks are who they are because it’s a decision they made themselves. The government has absolutely nothing to do with it! Leave the scumbags where they are. Everyone benefits!
Don’t shoot a man in a club or on the street; just call for his death on CNS.
Hatred is wickedness and a murderous intent.
Waste?
Yeah- waste. These guys are in their 30’s and will be locked up for 30 years plus for murder . Yes, they deserve to be locked away, but what a waste of their lives. If they did not commit murder, think of all the wonderful accomplishments they might have had in 30 plus years. Waste.
Waste for whom they shot and killed for lives cut short.
A lot of life is lived in 30 plus years…sad for all involved.
These scumbags would never achieve anything good. Longer sentencing for anyone involved in gang crime is a better way of protecting the good people of the islands. These sorts are better seen as hopeless write-offs.
You missed the point 12:00 pm.
What was the point?
If they did not get involved in gangs- if they did not commit murder, they would not be locked up for 30 plus years and in those 30 years would have a lot of live experiences. Now, for the next 30 years they are locked up missing out on many of those positive life experiences. That, IMO, is a waste and very sad. I also have not forgotten the ones who were tragically killed- young lives taken too soon- waste & also very sad.Hope that answers “ what was the point” – 10:37.
Justice Henderson did the right thing
I say let the scumbags rot! Absolutely no use to society! Their release shouldn’t even be a topic of discussion
I agree. Let these worthless scumbags rot! They should never see the light of day again. Released? only if they’re gonna be dropped off on a deserted island so far away from Cayman that no one will ever be able to figure out directions/co-ordinates that can lead them back here.
With all these murder cases up for Tariff hearings we are seeing the impact of this gang culture and the lives lost as a consequence. What it has highlight as well is the RCIPS good work in taking these killers off our streets. Despite the naysayers and heavy criticism from the bloggers of our police that they can’t solve crime, i think it is only fair we give credit when it is due. Northward is full of very dangerous people not just weed smokers as we’d like to falsely lead others to believe.
The police would solve more of these crimes if enabling parents and friends would stop condoning and covering these wannabe idiots. What exactly it is they gain by slaughtering each other. All I see them getting is their butts locked away in northward prison.
The gansta mentality needs to be replaced by a choice for a better future. Yes, get these young boys (and teen pregnant girls) a chance at a decent life instead of drugs and crime and unwanted babies:
WHEN is the last time we saw “Learn to be an HVAC Tech $45,000 salary, or Hairdresser $46,000- Not everyone is going to be an Accountant, but what the GOVERNMENT CAN DO is to offer a path to a better future by free Community College and Free Vocational schools. I’d rather pay for 4 years of education than 30 years of room and board at Hotel Northward.
Good point!
They are pure evil! I am glad they are in jail for a very long time!!! The pain and suffering they have caused the families of the young men they killed, is immeasurable.
I don’t see it that way. The victims were gang members. I do not really have any thought about what happened to them. It is only when innocent good people get caught up in this sort of thing that I feel sorry for victims.
Is it happening in a sleepy christian community on a tiny rock mid-ocean or in St. Louis or Caracas? “He executed the victim in order that others might see him as someone to be feared and obeyed”..is it from a crime book? Please say yes.
Why were public funds wasted on expensive foreign lawyers for what is just a sentencing hearing? There are better ways to spend money on good people instead of wasting it on pond life trying to get off doing proper time.
I read the article. What are the different views?
Borden, so tough in his lady sunglasses.
As for Anglin…looks like he ram raided Cash 4 Gold.
Class acts the pair of them.
Yep – them’s his momma’s sunglasses all right !
Good job Judge , keep it up you will soon have the Island cleaned up and the prison filled up with heartless ? scumbag ? criminals ? ?? .
You next, then, Criminal-in-camouflage?
What a waste and very sad for all involved.