Mwafenga v. R

The appellant challenged his concurrent sentences for six violations of the Trafficking in Persons Act as manifestly excessive. The sentences ranged from 10-14 years of imprisonment including hard labor. The maximum penalty for a standard count of trafficking under article 14 of the Act is 14 years, the maximum penalty for trafficking children under 18 years is 21 years (article 15), and article 16 lists aggravating circumstances that increase the penalty for human trafficking to life imprisonment. The appellate court found that the lower court had inaccurately noted which charges corresponded with each victim, which resulted in confusing and improper sentencing decisions. First, the trial court erroneously sentenced the appellant for article 14 trafficking for Counts 1, 2, 5, and 6, but the victims were children and thus these charges should have been sentenced with reference to article 15’s 21 year maximum. In another error regarding Counts 3 and 4, the trial court found the appellant guilty of trafficking an adult of unsound mind in violation of article 16(1)(c), but the conviction should have been for article 14 trafficking of an adult because the adult victim was of sound mind. Ultimately the appellate court affirmed four of the six sentences related to trafficking children because the aggravating factors meant that those maximum penalties for were substantially longer than 14 years, rendering these sentences judicious. For the erroneous article 16 convictions, the appellate court substituted two article 14 convictions and imposed a substitute sentence of 10 years for each count to run concurrently. The court rejected the appellant’s argument that the sentences were manifestly excessive because they were well below the maximum available sentences.