EGN NEWS DESK
Three males who had escaped from a jail in Grenada and have been accused of hijacking an American couple’s yacht to flee have been charged with their homicide, the police mentioned on Thursday.
The couple, Ralph Hendry, 66, and Kathy Brandel, 71, went lacking whereas crusing off the coast of Grenada. They had been spending the winter cruising within the Caribbean of their catamaran referred to as Simplicity, which was discovered deserted in neighboring St. Vincent and the Grenadines on Feb. 21.
There was no indication within the newest police assertion that the our bodies of the couple had been recovered as of Thursday.
Trevon Robertson, 23; Atiba Stanisclaus, 25; and Ron Mitchell, 30, face two counts of “capital homicide by deliberately inflicting the loss of life of Ralph Hendry and Kathleen Brandel,” the Royal Grenada Police Force mentioned.
The authorities from police forces in Grenada and St. Vincent and the Grenadines have given totally different ages and identify spellings for the escapees.
The males have been additionally charged with escaping lawful custody, burglary, theft and two counts of kidnapping; Mr. Stanisclaus can be going through a rape cost, the police mentioned, however no particulars have been provided on these accusations. The three males made their first courtroom look on Thursday, and are due again on March 27. The Royal Grenada Police Force didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
The police had mentioned in a press release launched on Feb. 22 that three males who escaped from a jail in Grenada on Feb. 18 and made their approach to St. Vincent utilizing a yacht that had been docked within the St. George space of Grenada.
The prisoners have been recaptured on Feb. 21, the identical day that the couple’s yacht was discovered. At the time, the police mentioned they have been “presently engaged on leads that counsel that the 2 occupants of the yacht might have been killed within the course of.”
At a information convention on Feb. 26, Commissioner Don McKenzie of the Royal Grenada Police Force that “info means that, whereas touring between Grenada and St. Vincent, they disposed of the occupants.”
During a Feb. 26 information convention, Junior Simmons, superintendent of the Royal St. Vincent and the Grenadines Police Force, mentioned the joint investigation into the disappearance with Grenada police was ongoing, and he mentioned the couple was presumed dead.
The investigation revealed that whereas crusing from Grenada, “the suspects dedicated a number of felony acts together with bodily hurt to the couple,” he mentioned.
The couple, who have been married for 27 years, have been “veteran cruisers,” in response to the Salty Dawg Sailing Association, a nonprofit that brings collectively a neighborhood of sailors engaged in long-distance cruising on their boats. The couple have been longtime members, the group mentioned in a press release, and “they each contributed to constructing the S.D.S.A.”
In a joint household assertion posted on the affiliation’s web site on Feb. 27, Nick Buro, the son of Ms. Brandel, and Bryan Hendry, the son of Mr. Hendry, mentioned that “if we’ve got realized something from this tragic occasion, it’s that we all know they left this world in a greater place than it was earlier than they have been born.”
“Ralph and Kathy lived a life that the majority of us can solely dream of,” the message mentioned. “Sailing the jap coast of the United States, dwelling on their residence Simplicity, making mates with everybody they encountered, singing, dancing and laughing with family and friends — that’s who Ralph and Kathy have been and that’s how they are going to be remembered in our hearts.”
