NASSAU| A ruling handed down by Supreme Court Justice Deborah Fraser this afternoon proved that the Carl Bethel term in the Attorney General’s Office and leadership at the Department of Public Prosecutions (DPP) has created a catastrophe for citizens in the administration of Justice.
You recall how BP (who not one day ever sat a single Bar exam) noted the fact that Carl Bethel hired two African lawyers in the DPP’s office to carry out the work in assisting Garvin Gaskin in the exercise of his constitutional duties.
You should also remember how back in December 2019 how Bahamas Press reported that Justice Bernard Turner got the shock of his life after a Voluntary Bill of Indictment [VBI] was filed on a matter in his court by one of the said African lawyers – who were hired with big salaries at the DPP office.
The learned Justice Turner, being meticulous and thorough, began to question prosecutors on the VBI, asking whose signature is being presented on the documents? He noted in his discourse that one of the VBIs was not signed by the DPP Gaskin. Justice Turner questioned why this was the case. The lawyers presenting for the Crown were lost! Thus we are here.
DPP Gaskin, who was supposed to be able to articulate the law, had argued that section 78 of the Constitution gave him the right to delegate anyone to sign a VBI on his behalf! What nonsense!
Justice Fraser also advanced the point of the law that under Section 258 of the Criminal Procedure Code only persons who have been called before the Bahamas Bar can sign a VBI and pointed to the fact that they must have been a practitioner in the jurisdiction.
Justice Fraser rejected the DPP’s arguments that he can appoint anyone (a cat, a rat, a janitor, a maid or, as in this case, a lawyer out of Africa who we all know were never called to the Bahamas Bar!).
The defeat in this case, therefore, means that every matter signed by the two Africans must now go back to the Magistrate’s Court because all VBI presently under the signature of those African Attorneys are not properly before the courts. In short, this means all those cases of RAPE, MURDER, ARMED ROBBERY and such, which Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions David Bakibinga and Deputy DPP Nkiruka Jones-Nebo signed, are not valid.
We at BP keep telling yinner Carl Bethel Dem did not know what the hell dey were doing!
Attorneys who worked inside the DPP Office left in a mass exodus following the lawless, unconstitutional handling of legal matters in the country. Bahamians were not going to stand alongside the dumbness exercised by Attorney General Carl Bethel DEM!
Meanwhile, as the defendants who are the subject of those many many VBIs, must return to the Magistrate Court because all such matters are now NULL AND VOID! Look at the DUMBNESS HERE, PEOPLE! We warned Carl Bethel, though – WE DID! And we never sat one Bar exam in our life!
We report yinner decide!
