No One May Be Forced To Self Incriminate:

Supreme court build­ing Kingston:

Continuing our series on Jamaica’s crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem we want to speak briefly about a motion filed by 8 police offi­cers in Jamaica’s con­sti­tu­tion­al court regard­ing the pow­er of recent­ly formed inves­tiga­tive group INDECOM’s pow­er to force them to tes­ti­fy against themselves.

INDECOM had served notices on the claimants for them to attend the Video Unit at the Central Police Station on September 14, 2010 to answer ques­tions in rela­tion to the fatal shoot­ing of two men at Tredegar Park, Spanish Town, St Catherine, on August 12, 2010. They did not attend and were sub­se­quent­ly charged by INDECOM with fail­ure to com­ply. The case, await­ing the rul­ing of the Constitutional Court, is for men­tion on May 4 in the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate’s Court. The attor­ney gen­er­al and the direc­tor of pub­lic pros­e­cu­tion was also named in the offi­cers suit.(jamaica​glean​er​.com)

I am not a lawyer ‚but with that dis­claimer out-of-the-way, let’s get some com­mon sense into the con­ver­sa­tion. Without tak­ing sides one way or the oth­er, it sim­ply comes down to the constitution.

INDECOM through its lawyers are con­tend­ing, had the police offi­cers attend­ed the Central Police Station Video unit to answer ques­tions from INDECOM they could have raised objec­tions regard their con­sti­tu­tion­al right to silence. Really?

If the con­sti­tu­tion­al rights of these offi­cers, and all Jamaicans for that mat­ter, are guar­an­teed by the Jamaican con­sti­tu­tion against self-incrim­i­na­tion, as they most cer­tain­ly are, then the order to tes­ti­fy against them­selves is a moot order. Lawyers for INDECOM cel­e­brat­ed as they are , ought to be aware that no per­son can be forced to tes­ti­fy against them­selves, and even though police offi­cers are not peo­ple in Jamaica, they are also pro­tect­ed by the con­sti­tu­tion against self-incrim­i­na­tion. I will not attempt to indict the com­pe­tence of this court , how­ev­er this is a straight for­ward mat­ter that real­ly ought to be decid­ed straight­away with­out advisement.

Every last Jamaican cit­i­zen is guar­an­teed the right to defend them­selves against what the law calls unlaw­ful arrest, they are empow­ered to resist arrest if with­in in their opin­ion they are being sub­ject­ed to arrest unlaw­ful­ly. To cit­i­zens of oth­er coun­tries that may be shock­ing news, but it is the law in Jamaica. Every cit­i­zen in Jamaica is also guar­an­teed the right not to incrim­i­nate them­selves. In essence no cit­i­zen may be forced to speak to the police, if evi­dence is deemed to be gleaned through threats, intim­i­da­tion, coer­cion, or offers and promis­es of any­thing mate­r­i­al that state­ment by that per­son becomes inad­mis­si­ble in a court of law. Unfortunately high-priced lawyers for INDECOM does not believe those guar­an­tees extend to police offi­cers when they are accused of crim­i­nal actions.

What lawyers for INDECOM are ask­ing the con­sti­tu­tion­al court to do is to dis­re­gard the con­sti­tu­tion­al rights of these 8 police offi­cers, in order that they may have more pow­er. Miranda rights as they are called in the United States, is a must for all per­sons so arrest­ed or being ques­tioned in con­nec­tion with an inves­ti­ga­tion. The right against self-incrim­i­na­tion is fun­da­men­tal, so fun­da­men­tal that even though one choses to take what is ref­ered to as the 5^th in the USA, in ref­er­ence to the amend­ment to the con­sti­tu­tion that pro­vides that guar­an­tee, that per­son may not be penal­ized in any way for doing so. I know that many will argue that is in the US, the truth is those guar­an­tees are indeed avail­able to every Jamaican.

It would be a good place for the court to estab­lish authen­tic­i­ty as a fair and legit­i­mate arbiter of facts as they relate to the rights of all Jamaicans. It would be a good thing for this court to make sure jus­tice is not only done but also appear to be done. Justice delayed is jus­tice denied. Rule with­out giv­ing the impres­sion that there is a con­spir­a­cy of sorts against these defen­dants. Rule and allow the case to pro­ceed in the crim­i­nal court. The rights of these police defen­dants are not impor­tant to Jamaicans for Justice. The rights of these offi­cers are impor­tant to me.