The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune News Editor

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

A FORMER police sergeant accused in a sweeping US cocaine and firearms trafficking case has lost his bid to overturn his dismissal from the Royal Bahamas Police Force.

A Supreme Court judge ruled that Prince Albert Symonette Jr had no contract when he was discharged, had accepted the decision at the time, and later presented contradictory evidence to the court.

Dismissing Symonette’s application for judicial review, Justice Franklyn Williams refused all of the relief he sought, including orders quashing his discharge, reinstating him and awarding aggravated and exemplary damages.

Symonette, a retired police sergeant who had continued working with the force through a series of re-engagements, was discharged in December 2024 after being named in a US federal indictment alleging cocaine and firearms trafficking. He argued that Commissioner of Police Clayton Fernander acted unlawfully and denied him natural justice by removing him without a disciplinary hearing.

But Justice Williams rejected the challenge, finding that Symonette’s statutory contract had expired in November 2023 and had never been renewed in writing.

The judge found that while Symonette continued working and receiving pay and insurance coverage afterwards, he was presumed to know that the Commissioner could exercise the power of discharge at any time and was effectively an at-will employee of the force when he was removed.

Justice Williams also found that the procedural protections Mr Symonette relied upon did not apply to him because the Police Service Commission regulations he cited concern officers at or above the rank of inspector, while Symonette remained a sergeant when he was discharged.

US prosecutors named Symonette alongside former Chief Superintendent Elvis Curtis and others in an indictment alleging that corrupt Bahamian officials helped traffickers move cocaine through The Bahamas to the United States. Federal prosecutors allege Symonette and Curtis each accepted about $10,000 in October 2023 as a down payment for assistance with what they understood would be a 600-kilogram cocaine shipment through Lynden Pindling International Airport for eventual distribution in the United States. Symonette has not been convicted of those allegations.

As of February, The Tribune reported that no US extradition request had been made for Symonette, who remained in The Bahamas.

The Supreme Court ruling centres not on whether the US allegations are true, but on whether the Commissioner acted lawfully in discharging Symonette and whether he was entitled to the disciplinary process he said he had been denied.

Symonette joined the police force on July 1, 1994, and retired in 2017 after 25 years of service at the rank of sergeant. He subsequently began a series of one-year re-engagements, the last of which began on November 1, 2022.

According to the ruling, Symonette was summoned to a meeting with Commissioner Fernander at police headquarters on December 12, 2024.

He said that when he arrived, a senior officer relieved him of his police warrant card, firearms certificate and police service weapon before he was escorted to a conference room.

Symonette told the court that the Commissioner verbally attacked him, accused him of corruption and handed him a discharge certificate. He maintained that he was not allowed to respond and was never brought before a disciplinary tribunal.

At the end of the meeting, officers from the Security and Intelligence Branch escorted him to his home, where his uniforms and accoutrements were seized, according to his account recorded in the judgment.

Commissioner Fernander offered a different account.

He said Symonette resigned, which he refused to accept.

The Commissioner said he instead told Symonette that because he was not properly contracted and in light of media reports, he would likely cease to be an efficient police officer under section 21(1)(c) of the Police Force Act.

Justice Williams ultimately preferred the evidence of Commissioner Fernander and Chief Superintendent Allison Brooks where their accounts conflicted with Symonette’s.

The judge said cross-examination exposed several contradictions in Symonette’s evidence. Symonette initially claimed he had been stripped and searched, but conceded under questioning that he had not been stripped.

He also accepted that he was properly discharged and that a WhatsApp message he sent to the Commissioner after his dismissal accurately reflected his position at the time.

In that message, reproduced in the judgment, Symonette told Commissioner Fernander:

“Morning Commander. I am sorry if I let you down but it’s not the way they say. I pray one day that you can forgive me. I am truly sorry.”

Justice Williams placed considerable weight on that response when rejecting Symonette’s later claim that the process had been unlawful.

The judge also criticised arguments advanced on Symonette’s behalf, saying some betrayed what he described as a fundamental and perhaps wilful misunderstanding of the law and the facts of the case.

Symonette had argued that he possessed a legitimate expectation, based on what he described as an unblemished 30-year record, that any decision affecting his continued service would come only after a prescribed process involving an engagement process, initiation of an application, recommendation from the officer in charge of his section and consideration by the Commissioner.

Justice Williams was not persuaded.

He said that even assuming such a practice existed, there could be no legitimate expectation where no application for re-engagement had been made and no contract existed.

The judge went further, finding that even if Symonette could ordinarily have expected continued re-engagement, that expectation would have been displaced by the circumstances in which he found himself — namely that he stood indicted on serious criminal charges in a foreign jurisdiction.

A police officer whose continued employment might otherwise have been expected would, the judge found, presumably be unlikely to remain or become an efficient or effective officer in those circumstances.

The Police Force Act gives the Commissioner authority to discharge a contracted officer if the Commissioner is satisfied that the officer is unlikely to become or has ceased to be an efficient or effective police officer, or if discharge is otherwise considered necessary in the public interest.

Symonette also argued that his discharge breached natural justice and due process because he was not afforded a hearing before being removed.

Justice Williams rejected that argument as well.

He found that Symonette had an available statutory right to appeal the Commissioner’s decision to the Governor General within seven days, with the appeal to be determined on the advice of the Police Service Commission.

The judge found that Symonette failed to exercise that right and voluntarily waived it.

Justice Williams said Symonette had instead accepted his discharge, as reflected in the WhatsApp message he sent to Commissioner Fernander.

Symonette had also sought damages, but that claim failed.

Justice Williams found no negligence, breach of statutory duty, high-handedness, bad faith or arbitrary, malicious, unconstitutional or oppressive conduct attributable to Commissioner Fernander in either his words or actions.

Bjorn Ferguson represented Symonette. Olivia Pratt Nixon and Nyane Orlander appeared for the Attorney General and Commissioner of Police.