Faced with the challenge of building a ministry from scratch, Minister of Justice Herbert Volney has also been mandated with the daunting task of ensuring the wheels of the various state agencies, including prisons and immigration turn smoothly. The job, the former senior High Court judge said, was "somewhat challenging" but one which he vowed would yield tremendous benefits to T&T.
For 2011, Volney said his ministry would be seeking to transform and strengthen units, including the Forensic Science Centre to ensure the speedier delivery of justice. "I had the challenge of establishing a ministry from scratch but we have a core ministry now," he said. "I have a legal unit which is working very hard to bring about transformation...I am also seeking to collaborate more closely within various units like the Probation Services and Legal Aid Authority."
Prisoner management
Prisoner management which hinged on the notion of reformation and restoration was foremost on Volney's priority. He explained that prisoner management as oppose to prison management involved changing the way incarcerated people were actually treated. "The policy of the Government is to move the approach of prisoner management from the retributive to the restorative in that not only is punishment a primary facet of incarceration but reforming prisoners for their return to society as better persons," Volney said. He said his ministry had no intention of "reinventing the wheel," but rather to ensure that the process was carried to fruition.
The restorative process, Volney said, would create a sense of worth to inmates even the most hardened criminals. "However, how soon they are returned to society will depend upon the nature of the crime for which they have been convicted and their degree of reformation," he said.
Electronic tagging
Volney said people who had been charged and had been granted bail by the court would soon be ordered to wear electronic tracking devices. The intention, he said, was to monitor the movements of accused people intent on fleeing the country. The idea, according to Volney, was already being discussed with the National Security Ministry and was expected to be implemented this year. "The Ministry of Justice is in collaboration with the National Security Ministry to introduce innovative methods of allowing persons out on bail with electronic devices attached to them so that their movements will be monitored," he said. "It would be for bailable offences, but offences which carry that measure of risk of persons wanting to leave the country and not return for trial including serious crimes like kidnapping and drug trafficking." Another key area which was carefully being evaluated, he said, was the Witness Protection Programme. Saying the programme required a high degree of secrecy simply because people's lives were at risk Volney, however, said a "proper forensic analysis" of the programme was being conducted to examine its flaws and to implement necessary changes.
T&T-Gold coast of the Caribbean
Each month, the State is forced to fork out hundreds of thousands of dollars to deport illegal immigrants.
According to statistics from the Justice Ministry, an average of 150 people are nabbed by immigration authorities each month for illegally entering T&T. The Ministry of Justice also has the responsibility of being the line ministry for T&T's Immigration Department. Volney said the majority of people who fled their homeland come from Venezuela, Columbia, Nigeria and the Ivory Coast. "Many of them are persons looking for a better way of life and still see Trinidad as the gold coast of the Caribbean," he said.
He said once detained, arrangements were made to have them sent back to their respective countries.
"Many do not have travel documents because it is a means of concealing their identity...But this often poses problems for their repatriation," Volney said. "It is a very expensive matter to repatriate illegal immigrants especially to Africa and the Far East where each person has to be accompanied by a detention officer." Saying the illegal immigrants were "repatriated as quickly as humanly possible," Volney said imposing stiffer fines would not act as a deterrent. "Increased fines have rarely acted as a deterrent for prostitution, that's why it is the oldest profession and it has survived," he said. Describing the problem as perennial, he urged the Coast Guard to conduct "more robust patrolling" of the Gulf of Paria to curb the flow of illegal immigrants.
Sex offender registry
Deeply concerned by the apparent increase in violent crimes against women and children, Volney agreed there was an urgent need to establish a sex offender registry. The registry, he added, would greatly assist in protecting minors, whom he described as society's most vulnerable. "It is a deliverable that the Ministry of Justice is looking at with a view to implement collaboratively with the National Security Ministry," he said. Saying that existing legislation was "already quite strong," Volney said instituting corporal punishment for rapists who criminally assaulted children under 14 was imperatively required. "The law is quite strong regarding sexual offences and it needs not to be beefed up," he said.
"If anything, corporal punishment should be made to apply for sexual offences involving the defilement of girls under 14. "For example, if a man rapes and adult woman he can be whipped, but if he rapes a girl under 14 he cannot be whipped...that's the law and we need to look at that. "Also in the case of buggery which is an offence in this country and there is no corporal punishment to deal with it. As a judge I was not one to spare the rod of correction." He said it was not the sentence that drove fear into a rapist but the order to be whipped.
Forensic complex
Amid repeated complaints that the analysis of exhibits was often lengthy which also resulted in the delay of court hearings, Volney has admitted that the Forensic Science Centre in St James has outgrown its "space."
He said plans were in place to relocate the centre to a complex. "It has become clear to the ministry that the Forensic Science Centre has outgrown its space and we are at the moment in our project management unit looking at getting out of Barbados Road and moving to a new complex where we can bring in more manpower and use the facilities that we have more effectively," Volney said. He added that apart from identifying a location, the entire management structure of the centre needed to be reviewed. "It's more than just identifying a building the whole management structure and systems of the centre needs to be reviewed," Volney said. There are different aspects remit of that centre that need a certain measure of independence under the aegis of the Ministry of Justice and good management would require better system implemented for efficiency."
Good friends with CJ Archie
In September 2010, Volney came under a scathing attack after suggesting that Chief Justice Ivor Archie benefited from a "sweetheart" house deal. In his maiden parliamentary speech, Volney accused Archie of corruption and collusion with former attorney general John Jeremie, who was "involving himself more and more in the business of the judiciary, in a way straddling the line of the Montesquien concept of the separation of powers and covertly undermining the independence of the judiciary." Archie, in turn, described Volney's statements as false and regrettable. The friendship between the two, according to Volney has "rekindled."
"Our relationship is excellent...We have had a couple of very good meetings of late in which we have rekindled the once collaborative partnership," he said. "My relationship with Chief Justice Archie remains very good.
Others were seeking to create a spat between us but the relationship is very good and I also enjoy very good relations with my former colleagues, barring none." Saying he has had no regrets about resigning from the judiciary, Volney said his appointment as a government minister was a "calling from God." "I enjoyed my time in the judiciary," he said. "I saw it as part of God's plan for me to equip me with the knowledge that I now enjoy, having to engineer the way forward so that more people can enjoy true justice in their lives." Saying he has not looked back since leaving the Bench, Volney said his intended goals could not achieved while he was still a judge. "Those are changes that I would not bring from the Bench and that is why I responded to the call and accepted a position in Government where I could make a difference in the lives of all."