Husband to be sentenced today

THE HUSBAND who set fire to a bedroom while his wife was asleep in it returns to the No. 4 Supreme Court today to be sentenced.

It was back in June last year that Richard O'Hara Cox, of Half Moon Fort, St Lucy, pleaded guilty to unlawfully and maliciously inflicting serious bodily on his wife Jacqueline on November 20, 2002.

He had also been charged with causing serious bodily harm to his wife with intent on the same date, but he denied that charge.

Cox appeared in court yesterday but his attorney, Vincent Watson, was absent.

Prosecutor Principal Crown Counsel Anthony Blackman said it appeared Cox had not communicated with Watson over the weekend and, as a result, the attorney was not present.

Blackman said Watson would be available today, and Justice Dr Sonia Richards adjourned sentencing.

The court had heard that the wife, who had a turbulent relationship with her husband, went to bed around 10 p.m. but awoke in the early hours of Novembers 20, 2002, to a burning bedroom at their Half Moon Fort home.

She jumped through a window and came face to face with her husband.

She already had burns to her lower limbs but was forced to flee again. Her husband, however, caught her and, as he started to beat her, he said: "I told you that I am going to kill you."

The wife escaped because she pretended to be dead. She was later rescued by officers from the Barbados Fire Service.