By Charlie Charalambous
THREE British soldiers appealing against life sentences for the killing of Danish tour guide Louise Jensen have assumed responsibility for their actions, a defence lawyer yesterday told a session of the Supreme Court.
“The fact even now that they have dropped an appeal against their conviction is an indication of repentance and assuming responsibility for what happened that night,” defence lawyer Antonis Andreou said during yesterday’s appeal hearing.
On Monday, lawyers abandoned an appeal to try and overturn the convictions, deciding instead to concentrate on having their clients’ sentences reduced.
When the appeal opened at the Supreme Court last May, the three ex-soldiers were aiming to walk free by overturning their convictions on legal technicalities.
Yesterday, proceedings got under way with defence lawyers arguing against the criminal court’s decision to impose sentences of life without remission on manslaughter convictions.
Justin Fowler, 30, from Falmouth, Alan Ford, 29, from Birmingham and Geof Pernell, 27, from Oldbury in the West Midlands, were jailed for life without remission in March 1996 for the 1994 abduction and manslaughter of Jensen.
“I have looked at all the decisions of the Supreme Court after 1992, and despite the existence of some horrific crimes I have not encountered any other manslaughter case where life sentences were imposed; the maximum was 15 years,” said Andreou, who represents Pernell.
Andreou said he could only find one criminal court decision where a manslaughter conviction had secured a jail term beyond 15 years.
“There is only one case, which was in 1967 when a person was convicted for 25 years on manslaughter charges,” said Andreou.
Legal arguments are focusing on the length of the sentence, which the defence lawyers describe as “excessively harsh” and “unprecedented” for a manslaughter conviction.
In 1992, the Supreme Court ruled that life meant life in Cyprus.
The defence also argued that the criminal court did not take into consideration the drunken state of the trio as a mitigating circumstance nor the fact that it the prosecution had failed to prove who actually dealt the fatal blow.
“The court convicted them under articles 20 and 21 of the criminal code (which covers aiding and abetting) but they were convicted as instigators,” said Andreou.
Andreou went on to say that no hard evidence was put forward during the criminal trial which showed that his client, Pernell, had come into any contact with the victim.
“The conviction of the accused (Pernell) was based on blood stains found on his shoes, which were questioned by an expert,” said Andreou.
During the prolonged criminal trial, one of the most expensive in legal history, the three soldiers declined to testify and their police statements were submitted as evidence.
Jensen was sexually assaulted and brutally beaten to death with a spade after being abducted from a petrol station in Ayia Napa on September 13, 1994.
Her naked and battered body was found two days later in a shallow grave, a few hundred yards away from a local police station.
The appeal hearing continues tomorrow.
