Over the years in these pages I have spoken out against the Liberal slant of Jamaica’s courts which in many cases causes even those without legal training to gasp at the outlandish results which come out of them.
One of the reasons for the high crime rate in the country and the break-down of social order may exactly be laid at the feet of the country’s activists Judges, some of whom have been corrupted.
In instance after instance there evidence emerges of galling disparities in the dispensation of justice, depending on who one knows or is affiliated with.
Most shockingly however , is the blatant contempt many of the country’s judges have for the people’s cause.
I have argued stridently that the vast majority of the Nation’s Judges who graduate from the Norman Manley law school are indoctrinated, leftist ideologues.
They are heavy on criminal rights and light on personal responsibility and adherence to the rule of law.
Many use the Courts as a platform as a medium to promote their own agendas
As Major crimes continue to rise, judges continue to use their office to subvert the process of law and empower those who would create mayhem and chaos in our country
It is time they are held accountable.
Evan Brown a Justice on the High Court recently awarded Forty Five Thousand dollars for one hour and $100,000 for four and a half hours – this was part of the $225,000 awarded to a former delivery man for false imprisonment after a high court judge found last month that he was held in police custody for more than five hours on a charge that was later dismissed by a lower court. Winston Hemans was also awarded $80,000 for malicious prosecution in a civil suit he filed against the State arising from an incident at the Norman Manley International Airport (NMIA) in Kingston in July 2005.
Brown, however, dismissed Hemans’ claim for aggravated or exemplary damages against the arresting officer, identified as Constable Andrew Anderson. “There was … nothing in the circumstances of the arrest of the claimant [Hemans], whether at the arrival area [at NMIA] or at the police station, that suggested that the first defendant [Anderson] behaved in a highhanded, insulting, malicious or oppressive manner,” Brown wrote in his ruling. Hemans claimed, in court documents, that he parked his motor car at the NMIA on July 19, 2005, and was heading to the arrival area to deliver a package when he was approached from behind by Anderson and asked to go with him to the police station located at the airport. The former delivery man said when he got there, he was arrested and charged with the offence of failing to leave the airport. Hemans said he was placed in custody and remained there until he was granted bail some time after 6 o’clock that evening. After three court appearances between July and August that year, prosecutors decided to drop the charge against him in September. But Anderson, in his witness statement, said he saw Hemans at the arrival west terminal area – clad in blue jeans and a white shirt – illegally soliciting passengers and collecting money. Anderson testified that he told the delivery man that he was committing an offence and ordered him to leave the airport. “Upon being so ordered, the claimant walked away,” the cop said.
HELD FOR FAILING TO LEAVE AIRPORT
However, he said that later that day, he again saw Hemans soliciting passengers at the airport, and it was at that time that he decided to arrest him for failing to leave the airport. Anderson said a search of the delivery man after the arrest revealed “money the claimant told him was collected from soliciting passengers”. Brown, after hearing both sides, said the question became whether Hemans was the person Anderson spoke to earlier that day.
“Did he [Anderson] make a mistake? In his witness statement, the first defendant [Anderson] described the person he told to leave the airport as a man dressed in blue jeans and a shirt. However, in the entry made … in [the] station diary, the first defendant described the claimant [Hemans] as a man dressed in black pants and a blue shirt,” Brown noted. “The first defendant did not say anything to the claimant aside from asking the claimant to accompany him to the police station, although the claimant required of him a reason. He, thereby, robbed himself of the opportunity to confirm his earlier observations and ground his action in law,” the judge continued. Brown also raised questions about the constable’s claim in his witness statement that the person he warned about soliciting passengers at the airport walked away. He said an entry in the station diary revealed that “that person was escorted to the bus stop”. “This is the incongruity … neither account made any reference to the claimant’s [Hemans] car, which he, admittedly, had at the airport. It strains the limits of the imagination to accept that the claimant would have walked with the first defendant to the bus stop without once mentioning that he had his own mode of transportation to leave the airport,” Brown underscored.
See story here:Costly Lock-Up — Court Awards $225,000 For Wrongful Detention .
Here’s the Issue: Brown, dismissed Hemans’ claim for aggravated or exemplary damages against the arresting officer, identified as Constable Andrew Anderson. “There was … nothing in the circumstances of the arrest of the claimant [Hemans], whether at the arrival area [at NMIA] or at the police station, that suggested that the first defendant [Anderson] behaved in a highhanded, insulting, malicious or oppressive manner,”.
In other words the Officer did absolutely nothing wrong beyond what he is tasked with doing, which is enforcing the laws. Police are placed at Airports to do specifically what this Officer did, keep terminals clear. All across the World in Nations which does not practice back-water justice as Jamaica does, Police officers are very keen about keeping Airport terminals clear for various reasons >
Jamaica is no exception.
like other Nations Jamaica has a responsibility to adhere to International standards which Govern International Airports,.
Those standards include but are not confined to ‚ensuring that terminals are kept as clear as possible so that rapid access may be available to emergency vehicles and first responders.
Officers also have to be mindful of Terrorism in all forms when they are tasked with being vigilant at International Airports.
What is abundantly clear is that this officer was vigilant and did his job.
What is also clear is that even if there was an error in the perception of the Officer as far as the identity of the offender is concerned, there was no malicious intent.
If the Officer acted without malice and made a genuine error in the identification process, where are the grounds for an award.
It wasn’t even clear that the offender hadn’t simply changed his clothes.
This young police officer may have made the simple mistake of using clothes to identify a suspect. But that mistake ‚not a maliciously act, did not warrant a dismissal of the case and certainly did not justify a civil award.
Clearly the court in this matter bent backward , contorting itself into a pretzel , in an attempt to find a way to award this offender.
What the ding-bat leftist judge said was that basically the officer acted appropriately with no malice, his own words.
Quote;“There was … nothing in the circumstances of the arrest of the claimant ‚whether at the arrival area [at NMIA] or at the police station, that suggested that officer Anderson behaved in a highhanded, insulting, malicious or oppressive manner,”.
Yet he awarded this offender money.
This guy was there doing exactly what Constable Anderson observed him doing .
It is a grave miscarriage of Justice that this back-water operative acting as a legitimate trier of facts can arbitrarily subvert the course of justice and get away with it.
For our part we will continue to highlight these instances where these Judges whom are sworn to uphold the law , usurp their authority in order to inject their personal beliefs and biases into the process.