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Last Updated: Feb 13, 2017 - 1:45:37 AM |
 (SLB Statement) Outspoken Queen's Counsel Fred Smith is warning that the Privileges Committee will do serious damage to the administration of justice and the rule of law in The Bahamas is it uses hearings scheduled for later this month to air matters currently under consideration by the courts.
Environmental group Save The Bays (STB), for which Smith serves as legal director, has launched several court cases which are to be the focus of the hearings, and he thanked other eminent legal minds who have come out in defense of the 'sub judice' rule, which says that matters under judicial consideration cannot be discussed publicly.
"Every officer of the court should be grateful for Bar Association President Elsworth Johnson and the unnamed fellow QC quoted in the press for defending time-honored legal traditions that are designed to guarantee all individuals a fair trial and, crucially, the appearance of a fair trial," he said. "These include the sub judice rule and the separation of powers.
"The members of this committee must keep firmly in mind that an awesome responsibility has been placed on their shoulders – for the sake of our national reputation, they must defend the principles of good governance, fair administration of justice and the rule of law. If they seek to use these hearings to trample over the territory of the courts, The Bahamas will be branded a lawless society where laws mean nothing, where political power and brute force win the day.
"The international community is watching carefully. We simply must affirm that The Bahamas is not some repressive dictatorship or failed state where the jurisdiction of the courts is casually disregarded, the rule of law tossed aside on a whim; it is a liberal democracy whose good governance is underpinned by a constitution, the guardians of which are the courts. They must be allowed to do their work unfettered by politically motivate intrusions."
Smith said he cannot understand why the hearings are moving forward at this time, as the murder-for-hire plot and harassment case against Peter Nygard and Keod Smith, which led to the violation of STB's constitutional rights "rape" of their privacy in the first place, and the group's subsequent successful constitutional motion, are still before the courts.
"Both matters are still live. The harassment case has been adjourned until February 2017 by Justice Charles, whereas the government has only just appealed her decision on the constitutional motion. Not only is the second matter sub judice, it is also subject to an injunction against further disclosure of our private correspondence and financial information, which the judge has affirmed is still in place. She ruled that until the conclusion of the appeal, the status quo must remain."
In addition, he said, the backdrop to the murder-for-hire case, and the constitutional motion, is intertwined with the four judicial reviews launched against the government and Peter Nygard and Keod Smith before Justice Rhonda Bain, and also the judicial review launch by 103 Lyford Cay neighbors of Peter Nygard against the government on the alleged faulty consultation process for works at Nygard Cay.
Smith said: "It is constitutionally axiomatic that the judiciary of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas - the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal and the Privy Council, resolve civil and criminal matters; not, as Fred Mitchel alleges, the "High Court of Parliament" which harkens back to a medieval era of monarchical absolutism"
He called for calmer heads to prevail and for all parties to await the conclusion of the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal and Privy Council processes before airing sensitive court matters in the public domain, as this would run the serious risk of "short-circuiting" justice and set a very dangerous precedent for the future.
"Otherwise, The Bahamas will be branded as a banana republic where no one feels safe either personally or in their investments. The country, having recently been downgraded by Moody's, can ill afford such negative international stigma," he added.
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