Chapter 1
This story is about a Cricket player, convicted of murder and given the death penalty for his crime. Cricket is a sport loved by millions across the globe due to the thrill and excitement. Cricket as a sport has a huge fan following in countries of Asia, Australia, UK, New Zealand and the Caribbean islands.
Players are loved and respected all over the world and have a huge fan following. There is only one such incident, where a cricket player was given a death penalty due to the crime committed by him within a year.
Leslie George Hylton was born on 29-March-1905 in Kingston Jamaica, in the lower strata of Jamaican society. He was not aware of his father and lost his mother at the age of three years.
Raised by his sister and aunt, he lost his sister when he was just a teenager. His education was incomplete, and he grew up in an impoverished background. The sudden demise of his aunt, lead him to leave school and take up different jobs like tailoring and other unskilled jobs.
As a young man, Hylton was burly, having strong shoulders and legs. He continued to work in petty jobs to earn his living. Interested in cricket as most Jamaicans are, he often spent his time watching the local cricket matches. He used to play with local kids using a coconut branch and a tennis ball.
The passion and love for the game of cricket increased gradually for Hylton, and he trained himself as an all-rounder, one who can ball fast and quick and also bat at the lower end. During the 1920s there were limited opportunities for first-class cricket in Jamaica due to the distance of Jamaica with other cricket playing colonies.
Chapter 2
Leslie Hylton was invited by a local cricket club to play for their team, where he put a formidable performance. He became a part of the local team. At the beginning of 1927, visiting England team was invited to play two tests against the Jamaican team as their practise match.
Hylton received his first opportunity to play the first-class match, as a part of the Jamaican team in Sabina Park on 19-Feb-1927. In the two innings, he scored 32 and 7 runs respectively, without taking any wickets with his bowling in the first match.
In the second match, Hylton produced a spell taking five wickets and scoring 3 and 53 runs. His sincere effort and performance caught the eyes of West Indian selectors. International Cricket matches were not played that frequently. Hylton continued to play first-class matches but was ignored for the West Indies test team.
In 1934, England test team visited West Indies for test match series of four matches. Hylton was provided with his first opportunity and selected as a part of the West Indian test team. Hylton performed well with both ball and bat, taking three wickets and scoring 19 runs.
This performance helped Hylton to keep his place for the remaining three test matches. The test series was eventually won by West Indies. In 1939 West Indies team visited England for test series. Hylton was included, in the squad.
Though he performed well in the practice matches but eventually ran out of form after the first two test matches and dropped for the remaining two test matches. Hylton played six test matches for West Indies scoring 70 runs altogether taking 16 wickets as a bowler. He also played a total of 40 first-class matches scoring about 843 runs.
Chapter 3
Hylton experience as an international cricketer helped him in getting a better-paid job at the department of Jamaican civil services. He was respected, as a cricket player who represented West Indies by the Jamaicans and was pretty popular amongst locals.
In 1940 he met Lurline Rose, daughter of a police inspector in Jamaica. They both kept dating and eventually fell in love. Jamaican society was a class-ridden society and Hylton ranked well below in the ranks of the society.
Lurline Rose was much educated and belonged to a higher strata of society. Despite the international cricket fame and a good job, Rose family was against their marriage and opposed vehemently.
Hylton was still a respected man in Jamaica, so overriding the opposition from Rose’s parents they married in 1942; Lurline Rose aspired to be a fashion designer. Days and years went by smoothly without much trouble a son was born to them.
To fulfil her dream of fashion designing, Lurline Rose left for New York in the US for more pursuing a course. Though there was a distance between husband and wife, Hylton was happy that her wife is fulfilling her dream of becoming a fashion designer.
Lurline Rose, frequently travel to New York only returning for a couple of days in Jamaica to be with her family. Hylton was still happy with his wife and son with wife travelling to New York frequently and twelve years of marriage passed off smoothly.
Chapter 4
Something weird happened in 1954, that resulted in the development of a crack in their relationship for the first time. Lurline Rose was in New York during mid-April of 1954, when Hylton received an anonymous letter from the US, informing him that his wife is involved in an adulterous relationship with a person named Roy Francis, who was a womaniser by nature.
Roy Francis was a handsome, rich man in New York, and whenever Lurline Rose visited the US for her fashion designing course, it was alleged, that she spent a lot of time together with Roy Francis often staying together.
This letter disturbed Leslie Hylton badly. Unable to control his anger, he showed the letter to Lurline Rose’ parents and explained to them the behaviour of their daughter. Based on the advice of Lurline Rose parent, Hylton sends a telegram to his wife to immediately return from the US.
A telegram from his wife followed, stating that “All will be well; she will be back home soon”. Lurline Rose returned from the US on 2nd May, and when confronted with the letter, she denied having an affair with Roy Francis, suggesting that he was just a friend who cared for her.
Hylton accepts his wife’s explanation and continues with his life, but this doubt niggled in his mind, and he remained suspicious of his wife’s act in the US. He buys a gun and cartridges claiming that he had purchased the gun for security purpose to protect his family against the recent burglary attempt in the area.
Chapter 5
Hylton observed his wife handing over a letter to the gardener for posting it in the post office On 5th May 1954. He followed the gardener, but before he could confront the gardener, the letter was already posted by him.
He decides to visit the post office and requests the postmistress to permit him to read the letter that his wife has sent. The postmistress refuses to hand over the letter to him, saying it was against the rules.
Failed to get the contents in the letter, Hylton works upon a plan. Next day morning, he tells his wife that he is aware of the letter she had sent to New York, and that the post office had permitted him to read the letter that evening, she should disclose the contents of the letter to him, before he gets to read its contents.
After a lot of confrontation, according to Hylton, his wife, Lurline Rose finally accepts her relationship with Roy Francis. She also taunts her husband that she should have agreed to her parent’s advice and not married a person below her class and status.
She continued that she had found her love in Roy Francis, and she had slept with him multiple times. Hylton was enraged, to such an extent that he took the loaded revolver and wanted to shoot himself, but the weapon misfired, and the shot hit his wife killing her. Hylton called the police himself and was arrested subsequently.
Chapter 6
The trial against Leslie Hylton began on October 1954. It was proved, in the court beyond doubt that it was Hylton, who fired the shot. Only conceivable, defence for him was that of provocation that permitted him to commit this act. As evidence, Hylton provided the court with the letter, and also reconstructed the bedroom scene before the court.
The letter expressed love for Francis and hatred for her husband. Hylton lawyers requested the court to convict him of manslaughter under extreme circumstances rather than capital punishment. The prosecution suggested this as a fabrication and tampering with evidence.
The damaging evidence produced by the prosecution suggested that Lurline Rose was hit by seven bullets rather than one misfired as claimed by Hylton. They proved before the Judge that the revolver had a chamber of 6 bullets.
Hylton must have reloaded the pistol at some point of time. Indicating precise calculation and planning rather than blind rage or an attempt to commit suicide as claimed by Hylton. Moreover, verbal abuse does not amount to sufficient provocation in law.
Hearing all the arguments, the Judge found Hylton guilty and passed the judgement of hanging him. The judgement was challenged by Hylton, in the Supreme Court of Jamaica, but the Court dismissed his appeal.
A mercy petition having signatures of prominent citizens of Jamaica was placed before the Jamaican Colonial Governor Sir Hugh Foot. On 9th May-1955 the petition was rejected by the Governor.
On 17-May 1955, Hylton was hanged in the Catherine District prison and his body buried in the prison compound.
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