Fish vendor gets off with a fine

VISHNU RAMLOCHAN was a good father and a well loved fisherman by members of his community and customers. However, like most law-abiding citizens, Ramlochan felt the need to protect himself and family. And since he could not get a gun legally he foolishly resorted to purchasing an illegal firearm. No sooner he did so, the police got wind of it and raided his house at El Socorro, San Juan, on July 19, 2001.

Ramlochan, 33, and a father one,  who never had any run-in with the law before, found himself before Magistrate Deborah Thomas-Felix (as she then was) the following morning at the Port-of-Spain Magistrates’ Court. Contrite for his wrongdoing and not wanting to waste the court’s time, Ramlochan pleaded guilty and threw himself at the mercy of the court. The magistrate having regard to his age and previously clean  record, she considered a sentence of 12 months for possession of ammunition and 14 months for possession of a firearm as a proper sentence to run concurrently. That meant with the swift stroke of a pen,  the once law-abiding citizen will now be thrown among the real criminals of society.

Taken to the State’s prison,  Ramlochan filed a notice of appeal against severity of sentence and secured bail. But his biggest problem was to get an attorney to argue his appeal. He retained Senior Counsel Israel Khan and Larry Lalla to argue his appeal. When the matter came up in December last year it was discovered that Ramlochan’s notice of appeal was filed out of time through no fault of his own and therefore his appeal was not heard.
Following this,  his attorneys filed a constitutional motion claiming a breach of Ramlochan’s right to a hearing of his appeal.

During this time his attorneys were also able to obtain a court order restraining the police from arresting him and taking him back to prison to serve his term of imprisonment since there was no appeal pending. The order was effective until the determination of his motion. Subsequent to this, the State realised that apart from the out of time notice of appeal, there was in fact on Ramlochan’s file another notice of appeal which was filed within time. The State thereafter reinstated his appeal to give him another hearing before the Court of Appeal. The matter came up before Chief Justice Satnarine Sharma and Justice Stanley John last Wednesday.

In an attempt to show that Ramlochan was no threat to society or deserving of incarceration for his crime, members of his  community rallied around him, and through his attorneys put before the court a petition with 200 signatures claiming that Ramlochan was a good man and pleading for leniency. Further evidence was provided to the court that Ramlochan was a reputable dealer in fish, supplying residences of very prominent citizens. There were also letters from his pundit and a youth organisation in his community pleading for leniency.

Chief Justice Sharma made it clear that Ramlochan’s  offence was a very serious one and he wanted the message to be sent that the Court of Appeal intends to deal very seriously with firearm offences, even when illegal firearms are possessed by otherwise law-abiding citizens for their own protection. But he felt that because of Ramlochan’s  ties to his community as well as the very strong character references which were before the court, Ramlochan was not a harden criminal and did not deserve to go to jail.

Their lordships felt that Ramlochan’s case was exceptional and it was only for that reason the court was inclined to impose a fine on Ramlochan instead of a term of imprisonment. Ramlochan was fined  $1,000 for possession  of ammunition  and $3,000 for possession  of the firearm. He was also put on a bond to keep the peace for two years.