Magistrate Alex Moore reinstated

Mar 12, 2015 News

---

…complainant disappointed with decision

By Sunita Samaroo
The Judicial Service Commission (JSC) has ordered that Alex Moore, the Magistrate suspended on a number of allegations since last year, be reinstated to the bench.

Moore, who received the order yesterday, had been suspended with pay since November 28, last; days after allegations of inappropriate behaviour made by an East Coast Demerara businesswoman, Seerojanie Singh surfaced.
The embattled Magistrate was summoned to appear before the five members of the recently established Commission at the Court of Appeal, High Street, Kingston last Friday, and again this week for an official inquiry into eight allegations that were leveled against him.
Among the allegations Moore defended were that of inappropriate behaviour made against him by the East Coast Demerara businesswoman, as well as absence from duties and failure to inform the Chancellor of the Judiciary of his absence.
The Magistrate was also made to face the body because of cases he had dismissed while dispensing matters at the busy Sparendaam Magistrates’ Court.
He was represented by Senior Counsel Rex McKay in the closely watched case .
By way of public missive, the JSC said it “concluded an inquiry into a number of matters concerning the performance of Magistrate Alex Moore at the Sparendaam Magistrate’s Court.”
The JSC said that Moore was afforded a full hearing before the Commission and noted that one of the issues investigated involved a complaint by Singh, “whose complaint was widely reported in the print media.”
The Commission added that the 47-year-old businesswoman had an audience before them and was also fully heard.
“Given the representations made to it by Ms. Singh, the Commission is of the considered view that in relation to Ms. Singh’s complaint, no further action or intervention against or with Magistrate Moore is warranted,” the body said.
Moreover, the JSC said in no uncertain terms that the account provided by the businesswoman of her experience at the Sparendaam Magistrate’s Court “differed in material respects from the report carried in certain sections of the print media.”
According to the JSC, in all other matters engaging their attention they were generally satisfied with the responses Moore provided and as such, he has been reinstated to the Magisterial Bench.
But the JSC’s decision did not sit well with the businesswoman. Less than an hour after being contacted by this publication via telephone about the JSC’s decision, a clearly upset Singh left her Le Ressouvenir, East Coast Demerara residence for the publication’s Saffon Street office to register her discontent.
Singh had reported that the Magistrate behaved inappropriately and by way of complaint, she approached the Minister of Legal Affairs and Attorney General, Anil Nandlall, and wrote to the Chancellor of the Judiciary as well as to Ombudsman, Justice Winston Moore.
Within days, Moore was suspended.
Singh related that around 13:00 hours on Tuesday she met the JSC Commissioners and was questioned extensively about the letter she sent and the reasons she approached the media with her complaint.
The businesswoman said that during the 30 minute-long session, the Commission asked whether she would be able to forgive the Magistrate and if she would be content knowing Moore lost his job.
According to the woman when she asked why the Magistrate could not have apologised on his own, she was informed that the body did not have the power to make that happen. “I can’t believe this, who must we go to in this country? Why couldn’t he face me?” she lamented.
The businesswoman is adamant about the information she gave to the media. In fact, she said that she detailed the entire session which took place on November 12, last at the Sparendaam Magistrates’ Court. “I tell them everything Alex Moore asked me. I tell them about the sex questions and the jewellery. Everything,” the disappointed woman stated.
“If he going back to Sparendaam, I can’t go back there to face he. He ain’t respect me,” she said. The woman believes that the JSC should have held a confrontation between her and the Magistrate. “I feel like I was the one being tried,” Singh concluded.
It has been 103 days since Moore was served the suspension letter by the JSC. Though there had been speculation circulating in the media that Moore’s suspension was a spin off of him being heavily criticized for handing down a five-year suspended sentence to confessed drug dealer, Leonard Bacchus, Kaieteur News understands that matter was not dealt with by the JSC.
Justification has been given that the matter is subject to appeal as filed by the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and the JSC, as such, would be refraining from dealing with matters that are engaging the courts attention.
Moore was prominently featured last year following the suspended five-year sentence he handed down to Bacchus who pleaded guilty to trafficking in more than 60 kilograms of cocaine.
Bacchus was given a two year suspended sentence for also having 125 twelve guage cartridges and one hundred and fifteen .32 rounds of ammunition found at his Enmore/Haslington Housing Scheme residence.
The DPP is appealing this decision since the law does not provide for non-custodial sentences for drug traffickers. The Magistrate had pointed to the three-year time lapse and the resources the defendant expended.
Recently, the JSC dismissed Magistrates Sohan and Geeta Chandan-Edmond, who both presided in the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court, on a number of infractions. Both Attorneys-at-Law have since stated publically that the JSC’s decisions were unjust and their intentions to seek all legal remedies available to them.

---

---