Skip to main content arrow-down arrow-tail-right arrow-triangle-right calendar camera compass download email eye facebook flag mail phone pin play send square-right tag twitter youtube badge message

The State v Nimrod Miguel

  • News
  • 24 Jun 2014

Nimrod Miguel has received a sentence of nineteen and half years’ imprisonment, after previously being sentenced to death under the felony-murder rule in Trinidad.

Although abolished in the United Kingdom in 1957, the felony-murder rule persists in certain Caribbean jurisdictions, and permits a person to be convicted of murder if death is caused in the course of a violent offence, even though no death or serious injury was intended. The felony-murder rule has been widely criticised as “harsh” and “oppressive” and can result in wholly disproportionate sentences. In this case, it meant Mr Miguel, who was party to a robbery, was convicted of murder for a shooting, despite the fact that he was not the shooter and had expressly refused to take part in the shooting.

Mr Miguel’s case was referred back to the Trinidad Court of Appeal for sentencing, after the Privy Council, in June 2011, quashed his death sentence and ruled that the mandatory imposition of a death sentence in Trinidad and Tobago for a felony-murder was unconstitutional. (Read the full JCPC judgment)

The Death Penalty Project provided detailed submissions to the Court of Appeal setting out why life sentences should not be the norm in these kinds of cases and that fixed, determinate sentences were appropriate, in order to mitigate some of the harshness of the felony-murder rule. The Death Penalty Project had previously assisted Mr Miguel during his proceedings before the Privy Council.

On 24 June 2014, the Court of Appeal sentenced Mr Miguel to 30 years, but reduced it further after taking into account the time spent in prison since his arrest.

Edward Fitzgerald QC and Ruth Brander of Doughty Street Chambers were instructed pro bono to assist local counsel.

Read the Court of Appeal sentencing judgment

Latest news

Privy Council clarifies the approach trial judges should adopt when explaining “intent” to juries in The Bahamas
Read More
International Women's Day Q&A: Women in Human Rights
Read More
Cayman News Service: UK court rules against closed-door legal hearing
Read More
Cayman Loop News - Justin Ramoon, sentenced for murder, gets go ahead for judicial review
Read More
PRESS RELEASE - Privy Council refuses to allow Cayman Government to hold secret hearings in prisoner transfer case
Read More
Cayman Compass - Privy Council rules against secret trial for exiled killers
Read More
Cayman Marl Road - Privy Council refuses secret hearings in Cayman prisoner transfer case
Read More
NEW op-ed: Time to scrap capital punishment in Taiwan
Read More
Privy Council: Appeal dismissed amidst serious disclosure failings
Read More
James Guthrie, impressive barrister whose work in the Privy Council included a string of landmark cases – obituary
Read More
LATEST OP-ED: Hoyle & Jabbar - Death penalty doesn’t deter crime
Read More
New article in Kenya's The Star: Death row convicts in Kenya not threatened by penalty – findings
Read More
PRESS RELEASE - New research exploring socio-economic profiles of Kenya’s death row prisoners
Read More
Kenyan prisoners on death row weren’t deterred by the threat of the death penalty: new research findings
Read More
The Death Penalty Project pays tribute to James Guthrie KC
Read More
London-based NGO to challenge lawfulness of Guyana’s death penalty at CCJ
Read More
PRESS RELEASE - Guyana’s Court of Appeal refuses to declare the death penalty unconstitutional
Read More
The Conversation: 'Why has Kenya not abolished the death penalty? Habit and inertia'
Read More
Political and legal issues: reflections on our report launch in Kenya, Nairobi
Read More

Stay up-to-date with our work