A brave judge stands tall on the floor of legal tragedies

Jun 05, 2011 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

If there was anytime that the potency of failure pierced my mind since the PPP came to power in 1992, it was the day I walked on water. Adolf Hitler was the only human being that has been recorded as attempting the feat. It has been written that one afternoon, Hitler set out sailing with Field Marshal Hermann Goering. It was getting dark, and Goering told his leader that it was getting late. Hitler kept asking for time saying, “I want to test this thing of walking on water.”
Where Hitler failed, I succeeded on Friday, June 3, 2011. The place was the ground floor of the High Court. I went to listen to arguments on the injunction granted against the Advisory Committee on Broadcasting in the CN Sharma case. The pavement outside the High Court was flooded. Naturally so because whenever it rains Georgetown gets deluged, because all the gutters and trenches are filled with mud.
Visitors had to use the western entrance, not the South Road pathway to get to the courts. As I walked into the building, I just felt a coldness on my feet
The ground floor entrance was flooded, but I didn’t notice, and just walked into the pool. This was the condition that judges and visitors had to endure. What was frightening to know was that the rains, though heavy, lasted only an hour. And Georgetown went under water. It was the stark reality of collapse of a nation, and it couldn’t have been more graphically sited than at the fountain of justice – the High Court. So I entered the court of Justice James Bovell-Drakes and what an interesting day it turned out to be.
The tempo was upped when counsel for the Attorney-General, Ashton Chase, as part of his list of reasons for asking for the cancellation of the injunction, tabled the explanation that the prohibitive writ was served on the defendants two days after the judges signed it, thus leaving the defence with little time to respond. The judge became enraged and a severe tongue-lashing occurred. The Justice told Mr. Chase that the Registrar of the High Court took two days before she signed the document so that it could be served by the marshal.
Referring to her as an underling of the court, he said such a lower official should not be allowed to stymie (his word) the work of the court. So agitated was Mr. Bovell-Drakes that one gets the impression that the official will be cited for contempt of court.
At the conclusion of the hearing, I asked for an interview with the judge for the purpose of this particular article, He declined. I then submitted my question to him through his office attendant. I inquired if what the Registrar did was tantamount to contempt of court. But again the judge refused to speak to the media.
This writer has seen a letter by Mr. Nigel Hughes addressed to the Registrar inquiring about the delay in signing the judge’s decision. It makes for sad reading and leaves the rule of law in tatters.
In that correspondence, Mr. Hughes pointed out that Mr. Sharma had waited outside her office for two hours on the day court granted the injunction and for several hours the next day. If that doesn’t scare you, then there is the allegation by a marshal in another matter; this one involving Mr. Carvil Duncan.
The allegation is that Duncan tried to run down the marshal and the driver of Mr. Robert Corbin when they went to serve injunction papers. One of the most absurd situations in this country that must be changed by the next Parliament is the nature of the serving of a writ by a marshal.
Since I was a small boy, I heard that the marshal can only give it to the person him/herself. Then decades after, I found that to be true. I took a certain UG official to court, got an injunction and his secretary refused to accept the paper from the marshal.
In the case of Duncan, the secretary was spoken to, but the injunction papers were not left with her. What nonsense is this? How can a country in the 21st century tolerate a situation in which justice can only function if a writ is put in the hands of the person only? Why can’t you knock on his office door and hand his secretary the document? Why can’t you go to the home and leave it with the wife or the husband or the children or the security personnel?

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A brave judge stands tall on the floor of legal tragedies

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