Privy Council charts our judicial course

THE British-based Privy Council continues to chart our judicial course while Caribbean countries take their own leisurely time to fully establish the Caribbean Court of Appeal (CCJ). The CCJ is up and running, but for only Guyana and Barbados. The other islands need to have their Parliaments debate and approve the CCJ as their final court of appeal. The CCJ had its grand opening in Port-of-Spain in April. The headquarters of the court is based in Trinidad, but TT is far away from having the CCJ as its final court. Until that is done, the Privy Council will continue to chart our destiny with decisions which will affect the country. In 1994, the Judicial Committee put pressure on the Caribbean when it ruled that convicted killers on death row for more than five years could not be hanged. That was in the case of Pratt and Morgan. When that judgment was handed down, some prisoners had been on death row for as long as 16 years. The judicial system was working....but extremely slow.

Caribbean countries then put things in place to ensure that the judicial process was spedup. Trinidad and Tobago was able to execute ten killers in 1999. But other Caribbean countries were not able to execute anyone. In 2003, the Privy Council ruled in the case of Balkissoon Roodal that the death penalty was unconstitutional in the Caribbean. That sent shivers down the spines of the politicians. Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados and Jamaica got together in 2004 and petitioned the Privy Council to re-hear the death penalty issue. For the first time, nine Law Lords sat in London and by a 5-4 majority, reversed their decision (Charles Matthew) and said the death penalty was constitutional, but only in Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago.

In 2005, the Privy Council has given several decisions affecting Trinidad and Tobago. In July, the Law Lords quashed the seven-year sentence imposed on attorney Jagdeo Singh and ordered his immediate release from prison. Singh had been convicted of corruption. His conviction was quashed mainly on the ground that the trial judge never put his good character to the jury. When he was released, Singh had already served five years. On November 2, the Privy Council put to rest the uncertainty in the law in the case of Kumar Ali and Leslie Tiwari. The Law Lords ruled that a sentence imposed by a judge starts on the day of conviction and not when his appeal is dismissed. Then, on December 15, the Privy Council freed convicted drug traffickers Deochan Ramdhanie, Ken Gresham and Patrick Toolsie mainly on the ground of the prosecutor’s closing speech.

They did not order a re-trial for several reasons — that the number one appellant Mantoor Ramdhanie had died in prison on July 31, 2003, that a defence witness Lisa Merez was also dead, and that the other three appellants had spent nine years in custody. The four were sentenced to life imprisonment by Justice Stanley John at the Chaguaramas High Court on May 6, 1997. The judge ordered that the State seize $5.7 million in assets from the convicted men under the Dangerous Drugs Act 1991. They appealed, but the Court of Appeal comprising Justices Mustapha Ibrahim, Roger Hamel-Smith, and Jean Permanand, dismissed the appeals in 2000. The four appealed to the Privy Council and after they were granted leave in 2003, Mantoor died from a massive heart attack.

What is significant, was that the appellants never challenged the evidence of the police in the Privy Council, but instead concentrated their appeal on three fronts — that the trial judge did not put their previous good character to the jury; that the prosecutor’s closing speech was improper and engendered prejudice; and the sentences imposed were manifestly excessive. What was the evidence?  On October 18, 1996, police officers of the Narcotics Squad were in two umarked cars in Point Fortin. In the white car were Inspector Willliams, Cpl Ferreira and PC Baptiste, while PCs Bristol, Henry, Campbell, and Stoddard were in the other car. The officers saw a grey Galant  PAY 8234, parked on Mora Road just south of the Dunlop roundabout with its bonnet up. They recognised Deochan Ramdhanie standing in front of the car.

They saw a red Galant, RBA 1498, drive up and a brief conversation took place among the occupants before the red car drove off. The bonnet of the grey car was lowered and the police saw Mantoor Ramdhanie sitting in the front passenger seat. Deochan then drove off towards Cap-de-Ville Road where he was followed by the police. The grey car pulled along a mauve Hillman, PT 8175, belonging to Toolsie. Gresham emerged from the Hillman and went towards the Ramdhanies, but he hurriedly returned as the police moved in. After a short chase, the grey and red cars were stopped on Richardson Street where the Ramdhanies, Gresham and Toolsie were arrested. Inside the Ramdhanies’ car, the police said they found 5,540 grammes of cocaine and inside Toolsie’s car were 1,394.7 grammes of cocaine.

But the defence denied that cocaine was ever found. The Ramdhanies’ evidence was that Deochan was taking his father to the doctor, after he (Mantoor) had suffered two recent strokes. They said they were stopped by the police and put in the police car. They denied the police found any parcels, bags or drugs in their car. Toolsie said the police searched his car, but nothing was found. Gresham denied he was ever in Toolsie’s car. They were taken to the Woodbrook Police Station where they claimed that one officer told them, “This is a political thing, you better get a good lawyer.” During the trial, the jury was taken to Point Fortin where the police pointed out where they conducted their surveillance and where they arrested the four men. After some nine years in custody, Deochan, Gresham, and Toolsie, walked out of the Maximum Security Prison on Thursday.