The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

A media feeding frenzy was sparked recently by remarks attributed to the Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Ralph Gonsalves at a CARICOM Summit in Trinidad & Tobago relative to bail being granted in homicide cases by Bahamian judges.

He apparently questioned whether or not theses judges “live on Mars” as if to suggest that the honourable justices were solely responsible for what appears to be a lax bail system here in The Bahamas.

In different ways all of the attending Heads of Government expressed similar concerns with persons being charged with a homicide and being swiftly admitted to bail pending the trial of the matter. When I was privileged to practice law persons so charged were expressly prohibited from being granted bail in cases of homicide.

They were, however, entitled to a trial within six months under the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code Act. If that timeline could not be met then and only then would the Supreme Court grant bail. In recent times it has been opined that persons accused of murder are eligible to be admitted to bail on conditions, inclusive of wearing a monitoring electronic device. Even persons who would have been accused of multiple alleged homicides are now routinely granted bail. Something has to be wrong with this.

To solely lay the blame at the feet of Bahamian justices, however, is dead wrong, pardon the pun. The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council based in the UK has played a vital role in our judicial system, especially on the criminal side. State executions have all but been eliminated by the orbiter dicta of the Council in that a convicted murderer can only be executed where the particular case has been deemed “the worst of the worst”.

Unfortunately no court at any level has yet to determine and rule on what constitutes the “worst of the worst”.

Legislatures throughout the wider CARICOM countries, inclusive of The Bahamas, have yet to legislate a definition for the ‘worst of the worst’ so basically there is an ambiguity that exists and the hands of the judiciary are tied. Our legislators, at the stroke of a pen are able to define in law when a convicted and sentenced murderer should be executed. We could also eliminate the criminal jurisdiction of the Judicial Committee and retain the civil aspects.

PM Gonsalves may have been too liberal in his characterisation, but the question of bail here in The Bahamas and other CARICOM nations has become something of a joke. The Judges, however, apply and enforce the law as it is on the books and not as they would wish it to be. The promulgation of law is within the exclusive purview of the legislature and the politicians. I fear, however, that because of political considerations this systematic and debilitating way of granting bail in cases of alleged homicide will prevail for the foreseeable future.

ORTLAND H BODIE, Jr

Nassau,

April 23, 2023.