Facebook fugitive Alvone Maybury is today starting a 13-and-a-half-year jail sentence for carrying out a shooting and escaping custody.

Maybury described by his own lawyer as an "intellectual midget" fired at gang rivals on a city street just before Christmas last year.

When he was brought to court in July to be charged with the shooting, he escaped from prison guards. He hit international headlines after posting messages on his Facebook page about life on the run, bragging he'd got his handcuffs off and was "free as a bird".

Maybury was eventually found hiding in a garden shed and was convicted by a jury over the shooting after a week-long trial last month. He admitted escaping custody.

Sentencing him yesterday, Puisne Judge Carlisle Greaves said: "In the current environment in Bermuda, it is my view that these courts must seriously seek to deter those who have found it fit to arm themselves, despite all the pleadings, with firearms, and go about the process of terrorising this society."

He also commented: "The defendant took the opportunity to further undermine public confidence after his escape by arrogantly taunting, through daily updates on the popular social networking site Facebook. He showed disregard for the law and authority and the community."

During the trial, the jury heard Maybury is an associate of the 42 gang, and went to Captain's Lounge with two friends on December 18 to meet members of Parkside.

The rival groups got into an altercation and Maybury, 24, pulled out a gun and shot at the Parksiders outside on Reid Street, just after midnight. No one was injured and the gun was later recovered by the Police, with Maybury's assistance.

The jury was shown videos Maybury filmed on his cell phone showing him brandishing the gun in question and making threats that "niggas are ready for war". Forensic tests on the recovered weapon linked it to a bullet found at the shooting scene and there was also gunshot residue on Maybury's cell phone, suggesting it was nearby when a weapon was fired.

The jury found him guilty of possessing a gun and ammunition and discharging the gun. The judge meted out a total of 12 years for those crimes, adding another 18 months to run consecutively for escaping lawful custody.

Maybury has a string of previous convictions dating from when he was just 13 years old. They include throwing drugs over the walls of Westgate, assaulting a woman, and having unlawful carnal knowledge of a 14-year-old girl to whom he gave a sexually transmitted disease.

During the sentencing, defence lawyer Llewellyn Peniston pleaded for leniency, and detailed Maybury's troubled upbringing. His mother died when he was 11 and his stepfather shortly after that. He was put into the care of a sister, but she also died and he was brought up in Government care.

According to Mr. Peniston, Maybury's "world collapsed" as a result of the string of bereavements, and he lost both his faith in God and his value system.

He suggested Maybury was further troubled at the time of his escape because he was being kept in segregation in prison only allowed out of his cell for 30 minutes per day and had recently found out that his young son had in fact been fathered by another man.

"He has nowhere near the intellectual capacity of Aristotle or Einstein with his limited education," added Mr. Peniston. "I would submit with absolute kindness that I could best describe him as an intellectual midget."

Maybury showed no emotion in response to his lawyer's comments, nor to the sentence meted out by the judge. He declined to address the court himself during the hearing, and was escorted to a prison van with shackles on his feet.