Wellington, New Zealand — A person from Memphis, Tennessee has been discovered responsible by a decide in Fiji of murdering his spouse throughout their honeymoon in 2022, the prosecutor’s workplace mentioned Monday.
Bradley Robert Dawson, 40, killed his spouse, Christe Chen, who was 36, on the unique Turtle Island resort within the Yasawa archipelago two days after the newlyweds arrived in Fiji, then fled by kayak to a close-by island. Chen was found within the couple’s room by resort workers with a number of blunt trauma wounds to her head after the couple was heard arguing and didn’t seem at breakfast or lunch the subsequent day.
Justice Riyaz Hamza discovered Dawson responsible within the Lautoka Excessive Court docket final Thursday after a weeklong trial, the Workplace of the Director of Public Prosecutions mentioned. Dawson had denied the cost.
The truth that Dawson was carrying his passport and different belongings with him when he was arrested indicated that he deliberate to flee, Hamza mentioned, based on the Fiji Instances newspaper. The decide mentioned he was happy past affordable doubt that Dawson and nobody else had dedicated the offense.
The U.S. nationwide, who stays in custody in Fiji, faces a compulsory time period of life in jail when he’s sentenced in January. Fiji legislation permits a presiding decide to set a minimal time period to be served earlier than a pardon is taken into account.
An lawyer for Dawson didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
In 2022, a lawyer representing Christe Chen’s dad and mom mentioned their daughter’s physique was so badly broken that she couldn’t be embalmed for return to the U.S. and her stays have been cremated. Chen labored as a pastry chef earlier than returning to high school to turn into a pharmacist, and had labored in that capability at a Kroger grocery store in Memphis.
The household’s lawyer, Ronald Gordon — who didn’t instantly reply to a request for touch upon Monday — mentioned Chen and Dawson have been heard arguing over dinner the night time earlier than the homicide.
Dawson labored within the data know-how division at Youth Villages, a nonprofit baby welfare and help group based mostly in Memphis, the group confirmed when he was arrested. A web based data search confirmed no prison arrests for Dawson in Shelby County, which incorporates Memphis.
The Turtle Island resort, the place the pair stayed, is an unique and distant 500-acre island that accommodates solely 14 {couples} at a time. Yasawa is a bunch of about 20 volcanic islands within the west of Fiji, an idyllic South Pacific island nation of 930,000 individuals.
