Cops’ Appeal Against INDECOM’s Power To Arrest Set For May

The appeal brought by four police groups against the Independent Commission of Investigations (INDECOM) is to be heard next year.

The four groups – The Jamaica Police Federation, the Police Officers’ Association, the Special Constabulary Force Association and the United District Constables’ Association – are appeal­ing a rul­ing of the Constitutional Court affirm­ing the pow­er of INDECOM to arrest mem­bers of the force. The appeal was set for hear­ing in February, but could not pro­ceed because one of the lawyers appear­ing in the case was unavail­able. It is now set for hear­ing on May 30, 2016.

In July 2013, the Constitutional Court ruled that under com­mon law as well as the INDECOM Act, the com­mis­sion had the pow­er to arrest mem­bers of the secu­ri­ty forces. It also ruled that the pow­ers of the INDECOM Commissioner and his inves­ti­ga­tors in no way dilut­ed the author­i­ty of the Director of Public Prosecutions to con­tin­ue, takeover or dis­con­tin­ue any pros­e­cu­tion. But the four police groups are argu­ing that the rul­ing has seri­ous oper­a­tional and con­sti­tu­tion­al impli­ca­tions and must be chal­lenged at the high­est lev­el. The INDECOM Commissioner and the Attorney General are the respon­dents. Cops’ Appeal Against INDECOM’s Power To Arrest Set For May