For the first time since the en­act­ment of the An­ti Gang Leg­is­la­tion Se­nior Mag­is­trate In­drani Ce­de­no will be­gin hear­ing ev­i­dence against ten men al­leged to be mem­bers of gangs in the Princes Town dis­trict.

Yes­ter­day, Ce­de­no, pre­sid­ing over the Princes Town Sec­ond Court, set a Sep­tem­ber 12 date to start the tri­als against the men, all of whom plead­ed not guilty to the of­fence of be­ing gang mem­bers. She set the date af­ter a team of lawyers ac­cused the State of breach­ing the An­ti Gang Leg­is­la­tion. The lawyers claimed the State and po­lice pros­e­cu­tion had breached Sec­tion 13, para­graph 3 of the Act 10 of 2011, the An­ti Gang Leg­is­la­tion.

The sec­tion states, "Where a per­son is de­tained un­der sub­sec­tion (1), the po­lice of­fi­cer who made the de­ten­tion shall, with­out de­lay, (a) in­form the per­son of the grounds for his de­ten­tion; (b) cause to be main­tained a cus­tody record re­lat­ing to the per­son de­tained; and (c) record the grounds for de­ten­tion in the per­son's cus­tody record." The lawyers con­tend­ed that the po­lice failed to ad­here to the pro­vi­sions in the leg­is­la­tion and are fur­ther deny­ing their clients their rights. "This par­tic­u­lar Act deals with the tak­ing away of peo­ple's civ­il lib­er­ties. We agree tough leg­is­la­tion is need­ed but, if you are tak­ing away their civ­il lib­er­ties, do the right thing," Valere con­tend­ed.

The lawyers called for dis­clo­sure of pros­e­cu­tion doc­u­ments, in­clud­ing a record of their clients' de­ten­tion.

Po­lice pros­e­cu­tor Sgt Alex Fer­gu­son as­sured that dis­clo­sure would be made. How­ev­er, he said a State at­tor­ney had to be ap­point­ed to pros­e­cute. Ce­de­no or­dered that dis­clo­sure of doc­u­ments be made by 1 pm yes­ter­day and stood down the mat­ters. The ac­cused will reap­pear on Sep­tem­ber 20.