Jasmine Hartin is spotted shopping at fruit stand two days before she faces sentencing over shooting

Canadian socialite Jasmine Hartin was spotted shopping at a fruit stand in Belize days before she is due to be sentenced for shooting dead a local police chief.

Hartin, 34, pleaded guilty to manslaughter last month over the accidental shooting of Belizean police officer Henry Jemmott in 2021.

She was seen on May 24 wearing a black dress, a straw hat and carrying a plastic bag of apples and bananas ahead of her sentencing this Thursday.

Hartin is the estranged partner of Andrew Ashcroft - the son of British billionaire Lord Michael Ashcroft - with whom she ran a resort in the Central American country.

She has said she was sitting on a pier drinking with Jemmott in May 2021 when he pulled out his Glock 17 and handed it to her. Hartin said she was illuminating the gun with moonlight in order to see it properly when it fired a round into his head. 

Jasmine Hartin, 34, was seen on May 24 wearing a black dress, a straw hat and carrying a plastic bag of apples and bananas

Hartin is pictured shopping for fruit on May 24, a week before she is due to return to a court in Belize City for sentencing

Hartin was spotted on May 24 shopping for fresh produce in Belize, where last month she pleaded guilty to a manslaughter charge over the killing of a local police chief

Hartin pleaded guilty to manslaughter last month over the accidental shooting of Belizean police chief Henry Jemmott (pictured) in 2021. He was 42 at the time of his death

The Belizean courthouse heard during the trial that the legal precedence of a guilty plea for the offence in question was not custodial but rather a fine.

The judge said he was unlikely to 'veer away' from the precedent but had warned Hartin in an earlier hearing that he was 'not bound' by it.

Her appearance on Thursday will come after the judge has received a socio-economic report on Hartin, which will be used to determine the size of the fine.

Hartin's voice trembled as she stood in the small wooden dock to enter her last-minute plea in the packed courtroom last month.

Outside court, Hartin said: 'I just want Henry's family to have peace now and I want this whole thing to be behind all of us so we can heal.' 

Also attending court were the dead officer's sisters and his daughter, who have stoically attended court proceedings since he was killed almost two years ago and maintained that they do not believe the shooting was accidental.

His sister, Cherry Jemmott, told CBS's 48 Hours that her brother would never treat his gun in such a cavalier way. 

'He is so skillful, and he is so careful,' she said.

A judge told Hartin that it was unlikely she would receive a custodial sentence and was more likely to be fined

Before she appears in court on Thursday the judge is expected to have reviewed a report on her economic status so an appropriately sized fine can be issued

While on bail before the trial, Hartin gave several TV interviews in which she insisted that the shooting was accidental and that Jemmott was a trusted friend who was showing her how to use the gun for protection after she was attacked at a party.

But she said the gun went off as she tried to hand him the magazine and a single bullet struck him in the head, causing his body to slump on top of her.

She said that she struggled under his weight and that she was unable to prevent his body from slipping into the water. His body was found in the water off San Pedro, Belize, with a single bullet wound to the head.

Hartin has always maintained that while she had consumed a few drinks, she was not drunk on the night Jemmott was killed.

But her former partner Andrew Ashcroft – the younger son of Ashcroft – claimed the mother of his children was 'drinking heavily' before the shooting in May 2021.

In a statement submitted to the court, he claimed she had as many as eight wines and some shots at a party on the evening of the incident.

Her lawyer Hubert Elrington said she has paid compensation to Jemmott's common-law wife and five children, who are aged between seven and 18 years old.

Ashcroft, 45, (left, with Hartin) said in his statement that the two had attended a party at the Sunset Lounge until about 11pm on May 28, 2021

Hartin's former partner Andrew Ashcroft (pictured) is the younger son of Lord Ashcroft. He has claimed the mother of his children was 'drinking heavily' before the shooting in May 2021 

In August last year she claimed vengeful officers plotted to murder her and disguise her death as a botched jailbreak.

She said at the time that 'corrupt' police in Belize City unlocked her cell in the middle of the night and motioned her towards a back door - insisting she was free to go.

Hartin sensed it was a trap and refused to run, telling officers: 'I know you will shoot me in the back.'

The alleged incident happened when Hartin was detained on May 19, 2022, for supposedly arranging 'hits' on Belize Police Commissioner Chester Williams and a family court magistrate.

She was cleared this week by Williams who conceded there was never any credible threat to either himself or Dale Cayetano, who oversaw Hartin's child custody battle with ex-partner Andrew Ashcroft, the son of Lord Ashcroft.

'They came to me and said, you're free to go. I went to walk out the front door and they said, no, no, no, go out the back door,' she told the Daily Mail.

'I knew exactly what that meant. The police are notorious in Belize and it's a trick they use. They typically either shoot you dead or arrest you again and hit you with more charges for trying to escape.'

Hartin leaves court in tears last month after pleading guilty to manslaughter by negligence at the Belize City Supreme Court

Pictured is Belize Police Superintendent Henry Jemmott, who was shot dead in 2021 . She said he knew him for years and that she was friends with her former partner Andrew Ashcroft

Hartin and former partner Andrew, 44, had five-year-old twins Charlie and Elle together

'I said, not a chance in hell. I know exactly what you're up to, you guys will shoot me in the back. They started laughing at me and said, you're smart, Hartin.

'They also wouldn't give me food or water and they made me clean out the toilet with my bare hands, it was disgusting.'

Hartin met Ashcroft in Belize the year she arrived in 2014.

In 2016 they got engaged and had twin children - she met Jemmott the same year, she told 48 Hours.

The manslaughter case ended her relationship with Ashcroft after he allegedly barred her from their apartment and limited access to their five-year-old twins, Charlie and Elle.

Hartin filed for custody in the family court but the case ended abruptly after Commissioner Williams announced that an unnamed woman had allegedly hired a Belize City street gang to take out himself and Cayetano.

On May 26, 2022 - six days after Hartin was taken in for questioning - Cayetano handed legal custody of the children to their father, who soon left Belize and moved to the Turks and Caicos Islands to launch a new hotel.