Geisha Kow­lessar

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has promised to leave no stone un­turned in the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to mur­der of Dana See­ta­hal, SC.The prime min­is­ter made the state­ment af­ter she con­vened an emer­gency meet­ing of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil to dis­cuss See­ta­hal's killing yes­ter­day.Per­sad-Bisses­sar is the head of the coun­cil.

In a state­ment is­sued yes­ter­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she al­so spoke with Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie and they had agreed to meet at the ear­li­est pos­si­ble time to dis­cuss nec­es­sary re­forms in the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem in­clud­ing se­cu­ri­ty is­sues.Ex­press­ing sad­ness and shock over See­ta­hal's death, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, "It is a rep­re­hen­si­ble act which has robbed us all of one of our na­tion's best and bright­est daugh­ters.

"Even those who nev­er met Dana See­ta­hal would recog­nise her through the life she lived and the proud lega­cy now left."There is an abyss of loss and sad­ness for this bru­tal re­moval of a sis­ter, friend, le­gal lu­mi­nary and fear­less, in­de­pen­dent thinker on na­tion­al is­sues."De­scrib­ing See­ta­hal's killing as an "out­ra­geous act of bru­tal­i­ty", Per­sad-Bisses­sar said it must be en­sured that the killers be brought to jus­tice.

"This act must not be al­lowed to be con­clud­ed by mere ex­pres­sions of re­gret and sym­pa­thy. I have en­joined the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty to en­sure that every re­source of the law en­force­ment ma­chin­ery of the State is utilised in re­lent­less pur­suit of ap­pre­hend­ing those in­volved in this most das­tard­ly and heinous act.

"I am res­olute­ly com­mit­ted to meet­ing the vi­cious­ness with which Dana See­ta­hal's bril­liant life was cut down on the terms she would have want­ed and fought so coura­geous­ly and fear­less­ly for every day," Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

Death must not be in vain

The PM said See­ta­hal would have un­com­pro­mis­ing­ly sought jus­tice and made her voice known.See­ta­hal's death, Per­sad-Bisses­sar urged, must not be in vain."Dana See­ta­hal would have made her tragedy an im­pe­tus and sym­bol for sweep­ing changes. Dana See­ta­hal would have fought with her last breath to en­sure jus­tice was served. By our re­sponse, let us pre­serve that lega­cy," Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

She said See­ta­hal's mur­der brought an end to the work of a le­gal and aca­d­e­m­ic gi­ant whose con­tri­bu­tions to the na­tion were far from com­plete."The le­gal pro­fes­sion, and in­deed our coun­try and re­gion have lost a tru­ly re­mark­able daugh­ter of T&T," the PM said."As a lawyer, her suc­cess and the high re­gard she earned from her col­leagues were tes­ta­ments to her de­ter­mi­na­tion to bold­ly up­hold and de­fend the rule of law."

She said in her role as a for­mer In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor, See­ta­hal demon­strat­ed the high­est prin­ci­ples and val­ues of in­de­pen­dent think­ing and was ground­ed in her love and pas­sion for the fu­ture of the coun­try."She earned a ster­ling rep­u­ta­tion as a lead­ing opin­ion-mak­er on na­tion­al is­sues of law, con­sti­tu­tion and crim­i­nal jus­tice.

"For the role she played in Par­lia­men­tary, le­gal and in­deed na­tion­al lead­er­ship, Dana will al­ways be re­mem­bered fond­ly. We have lost some­one who nev­er al­lowed her­self to be de­fined by the change she ad­vo­cat­ed, and whose courage and bold­ness will al­ways stand as an in­spi­ra­tion for to­day's and to­mor­row's le­gal pro­fes­sion­als," Per­sad-Bisses­sar added.

See­ta­hal's ca­reer

Se­nior Coun­sel Dana S See­ta­hal was an In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor for eight years.She was an at­tor­ney in pri­vate prac­tice and a lec­tur­er at the Hugh Wood­ing Law School in St Au­gus­tine, where she held the po­si­tion of course di­rec­tor in crim­i­nal prac­tice and pro­ce­dure.Born on Ju­ly 8, See­ta­hal held a bach­e­lor of laws from the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, St Au­gus­tine, a mas­ters de­gree in crim­i­nol­o­gy from Flori­da State Uni­ver­si­ty and was a Ful­bright Schol­ar.

She was first ap­point­ed an In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor in April 2002 and was again ap­point­ed on Oc­to­ber 2002 and De­cem­ber 2007. Her first con­tri­bu­tion in the sen­ate was on the Ap­pro­pri­a­tion Bill, 2003, which she in­tro­duced on Oc­to­ber 28, 2002.In Jan­u­ary 2006 she was made Se­nior Coun­sel. In 2008 she opened her own pri­vate cham­bers, El Do­ra­do Cham­bers on St Vin­cent Street, Port-of-Spain.See­ta­hal al­so served as a state pros­e­cu­tor, as­sis­tant so­lic­i­tor gen­er­al and a mag­is­trate.

She was a week­ly colum­nist for the Sat­ur­day Ex­press and pre­vi­ous­ly for the T&T Guardian.See­ta­hal pre­sent­ed nu­mer­ous pa­pers on crim­i­nal jus­tice and re­lat­ed ar­eas. Her book The Com­mon­wealth Caribbean on Crim­i­nal Pro­ce­dure, not on­ly en­tailed the­o­ret­i­cal knowl­edge, but al­so her prac­ti­cal knowl­edge earned over 20 years of ex­pe­ri­ence in the field.

See­ta­hal al­so act­ed as a crim­i­nal jus­tice con­sul­tant to gov­ern­ments across the re­gion and var­i­ous in­ter­na­tion­al bod­ies.