By News Americas Staff Writer
News Americas, NEW YORK, NY, Weds. Dec. 23, 2020: Justices on the Cayman Islands Appeals Court yesterday reduced the four-month sentence of an American couple who violated the British Caribbean territory’s COVID-19 quarantine rules to two months.
Skylar Mack and Vanjae Ramgeet, whose case made international headlines after they were jailed for four months for breaching the island’s quarantine rules, the first people to be jailed for the offence.
Mack, 18, was charged for removing her government-issued geo-fencing bracelet, a tracking device required to be worn by each person entering Cayman as part of the country’s quarantine-at-home program. After removing the bracelet, she left the Newlands residence in which she was staying to watch her partner, 24-year-old Ramgeet, participate in a jet ski racing event.
Ramgeet was charged with aiding and abetting Mack after having picked her up from the residence and taken her to the event, where they both interacted with several members of the public for at least seven hours without wearing masks or practicing social distancing, according to court records.
Mack is a Mercer University medical student who traveled to the island from Georgia on Nov. 27 and was required to quarantine for 14-days. But just two days and a negative COVID-19 test later, she allegedly removed her wrist monitor and left quarantine.
Mack and Ramgeet were originally ordered to perform 40 hours of community and pay $2,600 each by the Summary Court.
But the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions appealed that sentence and Grand Court Judge Justice Roger Chapple last week increased the sentence to four months imprisonment before the Court of Appeal halved the sentence on Tuesday.
