The Tribune

By LEANDRA ROLLE

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Minnis administration tabled the Bail (Amendment) Bill in the House of Assembly yesterday, which will enable magistrates to grant bail in certain matters and to provide rules to regulate bail application procedures.

The 2016 amendment to the Bail Act, which was passed under the former Christie administration, restricted the ability of judges to grant bail in offences involving intentional libel, assault, stealing and other previously bailable offences. The amendment also did not return the power of magistrates to grant bail for the offences of drug possession with intent to supply, rape, housebreaking, attempted murder and threats of death.

However, unlike the 2016 bill, this new amendment will make provisions for magistrates to grant bail for drug possession with intent to supply and certain firearms matters.

The bill reads: “...A magisterial court will have jurisdiction to grant bail for possession of prohibited weapons and ammunition; unlawful shortening of guns; any offence mentioned to the third schedule to the Criminal Procedure Code; unlawful possession of a revolver, unlawful possession of a firearm or ammunition (with or without intent to supply), unlawful possession of a gun, and assault with a deadly or dangerous instrument or means.”

Moreover, the bill will also require persons on bail to register with the Bail Management System as a part of his or her statutory declaration.

If passed, the new bill will likely be seen as a significant improvement in the eyes of many judges, who previously noted the 2016 amendment as “counter-productive” and a “sore issue.”

In fact, last year, the late Chief Justice Stephen Isaacs said stripping magistrates of the authority to grant bail in all but the most serious offences was “counter-productive” and had created nothing but “confusion” for magistrates and senior judges.

He argued that instead of being a “crime fighting tool”, the 2016 amendment only left magistrates open to the “potential of creating resentment toward the authorities by those young person’s caught up in this conveyor belt process.”

Former Chief Justice Sir Hartman Longley also echoed similar sentiments last year.

Earlier this year, Attorney General Carl Bethel suggested that the government was reconsidering previous amendments to the Bail Act.

The leader of government business in the Senate said: “Some things will probably happen, but we will see. We are looking at it. We have heard the complaints and we will work on it. We are looking at it.”

It is unclear when Parliament will debate the amendment. The House of Assembly will reconvene on January 29.