Waiting for the Caribbean Court of Justice

MIA MOTTLEY, the Barbados Attorney General, is right about one thing. Very few people can afford to appeal to the judicial committee of the Privy Council. A lot more will have access to the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) which will be inaugurated in Port-of-Spain on November 15. But this depends on the legislation which Government will be bringing to Parliament on Friday as well as the support, or lack of it, from the Opposition UNC.

There has been an increase in public awareness lately about the CCJ —  newspaper advertisements and public consultations — as the time draws closer for this new chapter in Caribbean history. At the present time, the Privy Council is this country’s final appellate court. The establishment of the CCJ will place a tremendous strain on the treasury of regional countries, some of whom cannot afford it. Caribbean gover-nments are not burdened at this time with appeal cases which go to the Privy Council. The British government bears the cost of these appeals. They have to pay the judges and the support staff in London. The TT government pays when condemned prisoners file their appeals against the death sentence.  The condemned prisoners appeal as “poor persons.” Therefore, the burden is on the state to pay for the appellants as well as for themselves. With the establishment of the CCJ, the individual Caribbean countries will be asked to provide funding for the court. When the agreement was signed in 2001, governments gave a commitment to provide funding.

With the initial figure of US $100 million being quoted as the sum for the start up of the court, Trinidad and Tobago will be bearing at least 37 percent of that amount. Then, TT will be asked to provide financial support annually to the Court. So, in reality, the attempt to gain our judicial independence is coming at a price. Coming back to Mia Mottley’s statement in Port-of-Spain that very few people have had access to the Privy Council over the years, many more Caribbean people will be filing appeals to the CCJ. Over the last five years, the Privy Council has adjudicated over 302 appeals from Commonwealth countries. These are appeals fully ventilated in court, and not cases where applications for special leave were made and thrown out at the early stages. Such cases include applications which condemned prisoners filed against their death sentence, only to have the British Law Lords throw out their cases before they could be properly argued before a full court of five judges. Of the 302 cases fully argued  in the Privy Council, 55 came from Trinidad and Tobago.

In 1999, 19 TT judgments came from the 57 cases in the Privy Council. There were several cases relating to the death penalty. Darrin Thomas and Haniff Hillaire took their constitutional motion to the Law Lords as they tried their best to stop the state from hanging them. They eventually succeeded as the Privy Council ordered the State not to carry out the death sentence until these men had their petitions dealt with by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Housewife Indravani Ram-jattan also succeeded as her death sentence was later substituted to manslaughter. Dole Chadee, in a last ditch effort to block the hangman, failed when the Privy Council dismissed his constitutional motion, paving the way for him to go to the gallows along with eight members of his gang. Angela Ramdeen, found guilty of burying her two stepchildren alive in a makeshift grave in Carlsen Field, Chaguanas, was also highlighted in the Privy Council. There was also the case of Anthony Nevada Johnson, the youth who was sentenced to death for killing former Commissioner of Prisons Michael Hercules.

In 2000, nine TT cases were dealt with among 52 judgments handed down by the Law Lords. In 2001, the TT figure dropped to seven out of 61 cases. In that year, prison officer Dougnath Rajkumar won a landmark case against the Public Service Commission over his non-promotion. There were 11 TT appeals completed out of 69 before the Privy Council in 2002. Among them was the successful appeal brought by former Magistrate Felix Durity against the Judicial and Legal Service Commission over his suspension. But another magistrate Herbert Charles was not so lucky when he challenged his demotion. So far this year, nine TT cases out of 63  have been dealt with before the Law Lords. The most significant case was the appeal brought by Birmal Roy Pariag against three convictions for murder. In that incident, Paria was convicted of killing his wife, her mother and sister at Bangladesh, St Joseph. The Privy Council reduced the convictions to manslaughter and sent the appeal back to the TT Court of Appeal for sentencing.