CJ surprised — juvenile prisoner could not be found

Chief Justice Sat Sharma expressed surprise yesterday when he learnt that the authorities could not find a juvenile prisoner who was incarcerated at the President’s pleasure for murder, and had appealed his conviction. 

The Court of Appeal learnt that only a few days ago the authorities eventually located Keston Adams, at the Youth Training Centre (YTC), but there was not sufficient time for him to retain a private or Legal Aid attorney. CJ Sharma said: “ In  this day and age it escapes me why they were not able to locate this boy in the prison. All it would have taken was a simple telephone call.”  He observed  that the authorities  was unseeingly unaware that Adams was sentenced as a juvenile and sent to the YTC. But while the Chief Justice had some praises for Director of Legal Aid and the Advisory Authority (LAAA) Israel B. Khan SC, he felt that Legal Aid could have been a little more pro- active in this case. The CJ acknowledged that legal aid has been setting some very high standards, and that Director Khan, “has been making every effort to enhance and streamline the system ... making sure people are represented.”

The CJ also signalled to attorneys who will be in the matter,  that the Court would be needing their assistance on a certain issue. That issue, he said, was in relation with the recent Privy Council judgement in a Jamaican case in which the Law Lords held that a minor sentenced for murder was not to be kept at the President’s pleasure, but at the Court’s pleasure instead. He wondered aloud whether that meant that the Court would have to supervise and review the administrative arrangement concerning that prisoner. The Jamaican case seems to suggest that sentencing had nothing to do with the Executive, but rather with the Judiciary. The CJ said he would want a full exploration of that issue when the matter is called on a date to be fixed in June.

Although Adams was brought yesterday before CJ Sharma, Justice Roger Hamel-Smith and Justice Stanley John, he was not represented. Special prosecutor Joan Charles who was suffering from a throat problem was represented by Ryan Cameron.  Adams was 15 years old  when he shot and killed State witness Paula Edwards, at her Gonzales, Quarry Road home, on August 28, 1998. Three years later in 2001, at age 17, he was found guilty of Edwards’ murder and sentenced by Justice Paula Mae Weeks, to the YTC at the President’s pleasure. Edwards was the State’s main witness to the murder of her husband, Curtis Sebro.