Inmates set free

For the first time in almost 20 years, Peter Forde and Orlando Lorde are free men.

At exactly 10:45 a.m. yesterday both men, after waving goodbye to staff members, stepped out of HMP Dodds for the final time and into the arms of tearful and overjoyed family members.

Forde and Lorde, along with one other man, were sentenced to 30 years in prison in 1999 for the 1995 rape and robbery of a minibus conductress in French Village, St Peter.

However, after appealing to the Court of Appeal in 2002, their sentences were reduced to 25 years.

They were scheduled to be released in 2018, but they were released four years early after their cases were reviewed by the local Privy Council.

Flashing broad smiles, Forde and Lorde, walked into the waiting arms of their mothers. (RB)