Counsel for an intellectually disabled man found guilty of sexually touching a girl argued that his conviction was unsafe and should be quashed.

Cameron Sousa-Saints, 27, was sentenced in March to serve two years behind bars for sexually touching a young person on an unknown date between July 2016 and August 2018.

However, Richard Horseman, counsel for Sousa-Saints, said the conviction was a miscarriage of justice and the sentence was manifestly excessive given the man’s mental health circumstances.

Mr Horseman argued that because of his disabilities, Sousa-Saints was not capable of instructing his lawyer at trial, and the lawyer had not properly considered possible defences based on diminished responsibilities.

He said: “This case raises all sorts of issues. This does fall into the category of a miscarriage of justice.”

Karim Nelson, for the Crown, said the Crown was not contesting the appeal.

He added: “We do so because in our view too many things went wrong in this case.”

During a trial last year, Magistrates’ Court heard that the victim, who was under the age of 14, had gone to the defendant’s house to watch a film with other children.

The victim said that when she was temporarily left alone with the defendant, he exposed himself to her and urged her to have sexual contact with him.

The victim wrote about the incident in a journal, but did not tell her family until 2023 because she was “scared and disgusted”.

Magistrate Auralee Cassidy initially dismissed the case against Sousa-Saints, stating that while she believed the victim, the defendant’s mental impairment hindered his understanding of his actions.

That ruling was subsequently overturned by Puisne Judge Alan Richards, who found Ms Cassidy had misapplied the medical evidence of the case.

At a sentencing hearing in March, Ms Cassidy convicted Sousa-Saints of the offence and handed down a two-year prison sentence, which was rapidly appealed.

At an appeal hearing in the Supreme Court yesterday, Mr Horseman said that Marc Daniels, who represented Sousa-Saints at trial, had focused on fighting the case on its facts and did not appear to consider a defence based on his client’s diminished responsibility.

He said: “The defence was simply one of denial and the decision was not to take that course.”

Mr Horseman said Sousa-Saints made no decisions about his own defence and, while a report found he was not fit to enter a plea, magistrates in Bermuda are not empowered to make such a finding.

He said there was an abrupt change in approach adopted by Ms Cassidy, stating that she had gone from finding that the defendant was not capable of forming the criminal intent to commit the offence to sentencing him to time behind bars.

Mr Horseman said: “There’s no rational explanation for it as far as I can see.”

He added that, given Sousa-Saints was similar in mental capacity to a nine-year-old, a two-year prison sentence would amount to cruel and inhumane punishment, leaving him subject to exploitation unless significant resources are used to keep him safe.

Mr Nelson, meanwhile, said that Mr Daniels could have sought a stay in the proceedings given the time that had passed since the incident or better raised the issue of Sousa-Saints’s mental challenges.

He added that the lack of instructions from Sousa-Saints to his counsel gave him great cause for concern, adding: “I really don’t think that this conviction can be safe.”

He told the court the Crown would not seek to bring back the case for retrial given the time that had passed since the offence and the lack of any further complaints in the intervening years.

• It is The Royal Gazette’s policy not to allow comments on stories regarding court cases. As we are legally liable for any libellous or defamatory comments made on our website, this move is for our protection as well as that of our readers