DEREK ACHONG

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

A High Court Judge has re­it­er­at­ed his plea for Par­lia­ment to con­sid­er leg­is­la­tion to hold po­lice of­fi­cers li­able when they abuse their au­thor­i­ty. 

Jus­tice Frank Seep­er­sad made the call yes­ter­day as he up­held a wrong­ful ar­rest, false im­pris­on­ment, and ma­li­cious pros­e­cu­tion case from a busi­ness­man from San­gre Grande and or­dered over $100,000 in com­pen­sa­tion. 

Jus­tice Seep­er­sad said: “The court is again sug­gest­ing that the leg­is­la­ture make the rel­e­vant amend­ments to the law so that po­lice of­fi­cers, who ar­rest cit­i­zens when there is no jus­ti­fi­able rea­son, can be dis­ci­plined and de­ter­mine whether they should con­tin­ue to serve.”

He al­so stat­ed that Par­lia­ment should con­sid­er leg­is­la­tion to make er­rant po­lice of­fi­cers pay the com­pen­sa­tion or­dered against the State in such cas­es. 

He sug­gest­ed that when sig­nif­i­cant com­pen­sa­tion is award­ed by courts for par­tic­u­lar egre­gious con­duct, such could be de­duct­ed from of­fi­cers’ salaries in in­stall­ments. 

“Tax­pay­ers should not be made to bear the bur­den of the mis­con­duct of po­lice of­fi­cers,” he said. 

“Un­til Par­lia­ment in­ter­venes, po­lice of­fi­cers will con­tin­ue un­abat­ed and un­ac­count­able be­cause they do not feel the brunt of the or­ders,” he added. 

He sug­gest­ed that the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) could not ex­pect to get the trust and con­fi­dence of cit­i­zens if its of­fi­cers con­tin­ue to abuse and vic­timise cit­i­zens. 

“You can­not lock up some­body be­cause you get vex with them,” Jus­tice Seep­er­sad said. 

Jawan­za Sim­mons, of Guaico, San­gre Grande, filed the law­suit against the Of­fice of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al and Spe­cial Re­serve Po­lice (SRP) Cleon Smith af­ter he was ar­rest­ed on No­vem­ber 20, 2019. 

Sim­mons claimed that he and his broth­er Ken­fentse were stand­ing at vend­ing booths along the East­ern Main Road in San­gre Grande near the San­gre Grande Mar­ket when they were ap­proached by Smith and his col­leagues. 

He claimed that Smith de­mand­ed that he drop the cig­a­rette he was smok­ing at the time and then slapped it out of his mouth. 

Sim­mons claimed that Smith, who had pre­vi­ous­ly ar­rest­ed his broth­er in an un­re­lat­ed in­ci­dent, as­sault­ed and ar­rest­ed him. 

He was charged with dis­or­der­ly con­duct and re­sist­ing a po­lice of­fi­cer and spent al­most 12 hours in a cell at the San­gre Grande Po­lice Sta­tion. 

How­ev­er, the charges were dis­missed dur­ing his first court ap­pear­ance be­fore a mag­is­trate the fol­low­ing day as Smith failed to at­tend court. 

When the tri­al com­menced at the Wa­ter­front Ju­di­cial Cen­tre yes­ter­day, at­tor­ney Keron May­nard, who rep­re­sent­ed the State, claimed that he had dif­fi­cul­ties in lo­cat­ing Smith to give ev­i­dence in de­fence of the case. 

Jus­tice Seep­er­sad al­lowed the tri­al to pro­ceed with the State not ad­duc­ing any ev­i­dence. Sim­mons’ claims in re­la­tion to his ar­rest were cor­rob­o­rat­ed by his younger broth­er, who wit­nessed the in­ci­dent and tes­ti­fied from Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison (MSP) in Arou­ca, where he is cur­rent­ly in­car­cer­at­ed. 

In his judg­ment, Jus­tice Seep­er­sad not­ed that Smith did not have rea­son­able or prob­a­ble cause to charge Sim­mons and act­ed with mal­ice. 

“The con­duct of the po­lice of­fi­cer ap­pears to be ar­bi­trary and not root­ed in the rule of law,” Jus­tice Seep­er­sad said. 

Jus­tice Seep­er­sad crit­i­cised Smith for fail­ing to ap­pear in the crim­i­nal charges against Sim­mons and in the civ­il law­suit be­fore him. 

“He (Smith) seems to be­lieve he is an au­thor­i­ty of his own and is ac­count­able to no one,” he said. 

Jus­tice Seep­er­sad sug­gest­ed that May­nard re­port Smith’s con­duct to Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro and he agreed. 

In as­sess­ing the ap­pro­pri­ate com­pen­sa­tion for Sim­mons, Jus­tice Seep­er­sad de­cid­ed on $75,000 in gen­er­al dam­ages and $25,000 in ex­em­plary dam­ages. 

The State was al­so or­dered to pay Sim­mons’ le­gal costs for pur­su­ing the case. 

Sim­mons was rep­re­sent­ed by Elvin Cud­joe, while Car­rie-Anne Grif­fith ap­peared along­side May­nard for the State.