Law Assn opposes Griffith on Bail Bill

In a statement on Sunday on the country's murder rate, the Law Association (LATT) questioned Commissioner of Police Gary Griffith’s support for the Bail (Amendment) Bill and instead urged the root causes of crime be tackled.

The association said Griffith's logic was that the legal changes were designed to detain those suspected of having illegal guns and ammunition, ahead of their trial, in the hope that fewer people would be at large to commit murders with those firearms.

The association said the CoP was suggesting murdered police officer Nicholas Victor and his alleged killer Marcus Thomas would still be alive today if the latter had been denied bail for past offences. However the association said such a plan could be done “only at great sacrifice to fundamental constitutional principles.”

It said its role is to both work with law-enforcement agencies to develop laws and strategies to rid TT of crime, and to support the administration of justice and the rule of law.

The association warned against the blithe abandonment of our constitutional protections, for short-term solutions to deep-seated societal problems.

“The fact that the murder rate has been steadily increasing over the years under the stewardship of all political contenders, and commissioners of police of varying degrees of skill and enthusiasm, is enough to compel us, together, to consider more radical solutions and to focus more on the root causes of crime, even as we tweak and refine our policing strategies.”

The association said the Privy Council had ruled that a law requiring the judiciary to deny bail to individuals charged with specific terrorism and drug offences had violated the separation of powers doctrine (State of Mauritius v Khoyratty.) Further, if bail is denied just because a charge has been laid, this empowers the police to decide who is jailed, when in western democracies the deprivation of liberty must only be decided by judicial officers, the association said.

“The abiding problem with laws which automatically deny an accused the constitutional right to bail is the grave potential of taking away his or her liberty pending trial when there is in fact insufficient evidence to convict.

“Earlier this year, we witnessed the spectacle of someone charged with murder being released after being incarcerated for ten years awaiting trial when the main eyewitness recanted his evidence.”

The association said, systems of criminal justice worldwide are plagued by cases of persons released after years in prison for crimes that fresh evidence showed they did not commit. “Laws which indiscriminately deny the right to bail, therefore, not only infringe the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, but also the right not to be deprived of liberty except by a fair process which establishes guilt on the basis of cogent evidence.”