Prosecutors mull options as student dies 16 months after being stabbed

Prosecutors in St. Vincent and the Grenadines are considering their options after student athlete Alia Mc Dowall, 17, died on Sunday, more than a year after being stabbed in the throat.

Mc Dowall, a student of the Central Leeward Secondary School (CLSS), had been battling health challenges resulting from the stab inflicted on her on the road outside CLSS, allegedly by a student of the Campden Park Secondary School on Nov. 28, 2024.

Doctors made an emergency intervention on Friday in an attempt to save Mc Dowall’s life after she developed complications following a similar intervention two weeks earlier.

Also on Friday, a public appeal was made for blood donations for the student.

However, she died Sunday morning even as her loved ones hoped for a miracle.

The athlete died on the day that her school was holding its annual athletic meet.

CLSS paid tribute to Mc Dowall on social media, saying in a Facebook post:

“Today, we express our deepest condolences on the loss of our student-athlete. On a day such as this, you would have been prepared to showcase your talent through running. Rest in peace, young one. Our thoughts are with you and your loved ones.”

Mc Dowall’s death raises several questions about justice for her family.

She died three days after prosecutors instructed investigators to charge her alleged assailant with wounding with intent.

iWitness News was reliably informed that the charge was to be laid on Monday, even as investigators have expressed frustration with the time prosecutors have taken to review the file and decide to lay a charge.

The Child Justice Act, passed into law in 2019, limits investigators’ action as regards laying charges against minors in the absence of instructions from the National Prosecution Service.

Although the law has not been operationalised, prosecutors have been guided by its intent since it was passed in Parliament, sources have told iWitness News.

What is sure is that the student cannot be brought up on a charge accusing her of causing Mc Dowall’s death in light of the limitation set by Section 169 of the Criminal Code.

In setting the “Limitation as to time of death”, the Criminal Code says:

“(1)  A person shall not be deemed to have killed another person if the death of that other person does not take place within a year and a day of the act or omission alleged to have caused or contributed to the death of that other person.

“(2)  The period referred to in subsection (1) shall be reckoned inclusive of the day on which the last act or omission causing or contributing to the death occurred.”

A legal expert told iWitness News on Sunday that prosecutors could consider charging the alleged perpetrator with grievous bodily harm (GBH).

The expert said that, practically, capital punishment has been outlawed and GBH carries the same penalty as murder: a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.