by Jerome Pinder
In today's Tribune (July 28th) in a letter to the Editor, Mr Reuben Sears is crying out over the injustice and ineffective justice system in the Bahamas, and in particular to the murder of his sister's son over seven years ago. Unfortunately, there are so many of these cases where family members are waiting for justice, while the accused roams the street on bail with no fear of the system, and quite often committing other offenses.
This letter reminded me of some recent statistics that I heard regarding our justice system, relating to the year 2007. During this year there were over 1400 cases filed in the Family Courts and over 1400 civil cases filed. These do not include Criminal Cases. I am sure that this trend has continued in more recent years, only adding to the thousands, upon thousands of backlogged cases. We currently have 11 Supreme Court Justices, including the Chief Justice, to handle the backlog of cases and keep up with current filings. It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out where we are headed or where we have arrived.
To add insult to injury, our PM recently said that in his opinion we only needed 13 Justices. In addition, the Junkanoo Minister tried to blame the problems on Defense Lawyers. Further, what good is a high detection rate for our Police Force if it takes 10 years for a case to get through the system?
What is so troubling, is that successive Governments (PLP and FNM) have allowed the system to basically crash. Currently, we have an administration that seems to be working on everything else besides the Justice System. If I may add, what good is a new Director of Public Prosecutions and two new Deputies going to do, if we are only going to have 13 Justices in the system? 130 sounds like a better number to me.
Our Parliament is getting ready to go on summer break, something we don't do in the Private Sector, and yet they have not passed once piece of legislation to tighten up on the Bail Act or other similar laws. Let the UN or Amnesty International put pressure on us and the laws are drafted up immediately. Sounds like the summer break should be canceled this year.
What is going on here? Is it just complete incompetence?
Some good points Jerome, but I must differ on one point – Parliament should be on an 11 month break not just a summer recess.
30 days seems to be be enough time to limit the damage it does.
Having sat in a few sessions of the Magistrate and supreme courts, I can say without any doubt, the system is shot. Finished, and certainly not the place one would go for Justice to be rendered.
As far as funding and infrastructure, the Government ignores it, but I believe they also actively manipulate and influence its actions.
Justice delayed is Justice denied, and the criminally inclined operate the system better than any.
As for the legislation written by successive Government administrations, most is sub standard, rarely implemented or funded and poorly interpreted.
Many acts could be judged to be unconstitutional, if we had competent, politically uncompromised Judges that is.
Most of the erosion of our society is caused by this lack, and aided and abetted by the political powers that be.
A sad state of affairs, but ours none the less.
Agreed Rick. If you look at it from that angle, at the rate we are going, we would be better off if they took a permanent vacation.
Interesting statistics that you highlighted during 2007. I don’t believe we only have 13 judges. That amount appears so insignificant if you have 1400 civil cases alone filed! There are approx. 250 business days in a year and if we assume two cases are tried and a verdict given each business day, the backlog increases by 100% from the prior year cases filed. Calculation ( 1400 cases filed – 500 cases tried and settled + 900 cases outstanding from prior year). This doesn’t even include the family matters and criminal cases.
The public needs to go a bit further and assess the time it takes the court to try family, civil and criminal cases. In addition, looking at the judges to population ratio, judges to cases outstanding ratio, etc; then analyze the rate fo growth per year of backlog cases. But it is obvious we have a serious issue on our hands.
So true Jerome.As they say, actions speak louder than words & from what I can see, there is no action.It is an absolute disgrace, I have been to a few hearings & I can tell you it is deplorable.The prosecutors are not very well prepared at all.Its as though that is exactly as they want it to be.I have asked for help on numerous occasions & when I was able to speak to someone, it was just to get rid of me, simple as that & that Includes the police, the so called “National security” minister & whomever else I have spoken to.It’s as though a brutal murder was a traffic violation.I can tell you this, if we soon do not get anywhere with this case, there will be a story for the world to see.A story of absolute corruption & Incompetence.I’m sorry, people say we have good cops, well, they must be hiding.I have lost all faith in the police, in the AG’s office & in the government.It is as though we are all in a very bad dream that you just can’t awaken from.Its bad enough to go through the murder of a family member, but when there is no justice, it makes it even worse.It is apparent to me that there is NOT ONE PERSON in the government today, or yesterday, that gives a damn, NOT ONE !If there is, please enlighten me. We are one big snow ball headed for hell.
Say all that you may.. There is no respect for the Law and there is no Order in our country’s justice system.. For a country of only 450,000 people, this is an total embarrassment.. And the Chinese build us a sports stadium.. What a total waste of time and money and the lowest priority in our quest for development and social improvement..It is all show and no substance..