Ramson argues for judicial restraint on executive policy
By Patrick Denny
Attorney-General, Charles Ramson SC yesterday urged Justice Winston Moore to exercise judicial restraint in dealing with matters related to executive policy. Ramson is appearing for the State before Justice Winston Moore who is hearing arguments to determine whether he should extend the ex parte stay of execution he granted on September 12 to condemned prisoners Noel Thomas and Abdool Saleem Yasseen. Thomas and Yasseen were due to be hanged at 8 am on September 13. They were convicted for the murder of Yasseen's younger brother, Abdool Kaleem Yasseen. On Thursday, in his arguments addressing claims of bias Ramson had cited judicial rulings which had said that the issue before the Advisory Council on the Exercise of the Prerogative of Mercy was mercy and as such involves considerations of policy. He argued that the Court was not entitled to take into account statements made to the press by himself and the Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr Roger Luncheon. Those statements had been cited in Thomas' and Yasseen's affidavit. In further support of this argument, the Attorney-General cited Dr Albert Fiadjoe on the subject of restraint. Dr Fiadjoe, he said, had contended that judges as a general rule do not review policies of government. Also in dealing with arguments that Justice Carl Singh's July 30, decision was ultra vires, null and void, Ramson cited an additional case decided in 1958. That ruling according to Ramson said that the court must have an inherent jurisdiction to refuse to hear a matter that has already been heard. This ruling, he said, could be applied to the attempt by Thomas and Yasseen to have the matters heard by Justice Singh to be tried in the present case by the use of the ex facie permissible procedure of a writ of summons by which they had approached it. Responding to an observation by Justice Moore who had enquired of Ramson as to how Thomas and Yasseen should have sought redress from Justice Singh's ruling if there was need to do so, Ramson said that they should have done so by appeal. He also reiterated that Singh's ruling was in line with Article 153 which allowed the Court to make any order it deemed fit. He explained that Justice Singh, denied the power of legislation, issued directions. In reference to sections of Thomas' and Yasseen's affidavit in reply, Ramson contended that the paragraphs claiming that the death warrants had been signed by President Bharrat Jagdeo without the requisite advice being tendered to President Jagdeo should be struck out. He said that the affidavit by the Head of the Presidential Secretariat he had filed showed that the correct procedure had been followed. He explained that the opinion tendered to the President by the designated Minister after he had received the recommendations of the Advisory Council is done in writing and not given orally. As such he said that the cause of action which Thomas and Yasseen sought ground as a result of the warrant being signed by President Jagdeo was frivolous and vexatious. With respect with the endorsement of claim by the condemned men, Ramson said that the issue of the illegality and unconstitutionality of the death penalty was bound to fail as was the other issues raised there. When the case resumes on Monday, Ramson will continue his address to show that some of the grounds which Thomas and Yasseen raised in their affidavit on which the ex parte stay of execution was granted had already been decided at previous hearings of their case either in the criminal or constitutional jurisdiction of the Courts. The condemned men are represented by Stephen Fraser in association with Nigel Hughes, Teni Housty, Anil Nandlall, Nichola Pierre and Roysdale Forde. Ramson is associated with Octave Hamilton and Sanjeev Datadin in representing himself and the Director of Prisons, Dale Erskine.
Fake client stole fan from lawyer A thief who went to a lawyer pretending he was in need of legal help and instead stole a fan was yesterday sentenced to two weeks in prison by Chief Magistrate Paul Fung-A-Fat. 35-year-old Gordon McBean who pleaded guilty, and for whom no address was given, was charged with committing the simple larceny offence on James Patterson, a lawyer, who has his office at the Maraj Building, Charlotte Street. The prosecution's case is that on Monday last, the defendant went into the VC's office, pretended that he was a client and picked up the fan when no one was looking. However, he was caught by an alert person who was in the vicinity at the time and the matter was reported to the police. 
|