Gail Alexan­der

Con­sen­sus nom­i­nee for the post of pres­i­dent of T&T Jus­tice An­tho­ny Car­mona has record­ed in a doc­u­ment of his work as ap­peals coun­sel while he was based in the Nether­lands for three-and-a-half years, as well as his views on pol­i­tics, rape vic­tims and some of the cas­es he has pros­e­cut­ed.

The in­for­ma­tion is con­tained in Car­mona's replies to an In­ter­na­tion­al Crim­i­nal Court (ICC) ques­tion­naire which he filled out for the ICC ju­di­cial can­di­dates' De­cem­ber 2011 elec­tions.The doc­u­ment, which lists Car­mona's nom­i­nat­ing state as T&T, lends in­sight in­to his views on a range of is­sues from the ju­di­cia­ry to the pol­i­tics.The 27 ques­tions yield­ed in­for­ma­tion, rang­ing from why he wished to be elect­ed as an ICC judge to how he would op­er­ate in cer­tain cir­cum­stances and his qual­i­fi­ca­tions and views on var­i­ous is­sues.

Among his com­ments in the doc­u­ment, Car­mona said at prepara­to­ry ICC meet­ings he had act­ed as le­gal ad­vis­er to Pres­i­dent Arthur NR Robin­son, who he not­ed was re­ferred to as the "grand­fa­ther of the ICC", on crim­i­nal mat­ters.On an­oth­er ques­tion, Car­mona stat­ed: "I have gained my ex­pe­ri­ence and com­pe­tences through the fol­low­ing pro­mo­tions in the in­de­pen­dent of­fice of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (non-po­lit­i­cal).

"I was pro­mot­ed from State Coun­sel I-II-III, se­nior state coun­sel, as­sis­tant di­rec­tor of pub­lic pros­e­cu­tions, deputy DPP and act­ing DPP dur­ing my 18-year ca­reer at the of­fice of the DPP be­fore tak­ing up my ap­point­ment as an Ap­peals Coun­sel at the IC­TY (In­ter­na­tion­al Crim­i­nal Tri­bunal for the for­mer Yu­goslavia) and IC­TR (In­ter­na­tion­al Crim­i­nal Tri­bunal, Rwan­da) based in Den Haag, the Nether­lands for some three-and-half years.

"As a deputy DPP in T&T I have pros­e­cut­ed in ma­jor and com­plex crim­i­nal tri­als, mur­der, rapes, cor­rup­tion, mis­be­hav­iour in pub­lic of­fice, very suc­cess­ful in over 90 per cent."As an ap­peals coun­sel at the IC­TY/IC­TR I was part of a very suc­cess­ful team pros­e­cut­ing ap­peals on war crimes, crimes against hu­man­i­ty and geno­cide. On leav­ing the IC­TY/IC­TR I re­turned to T&T to take up a sub­stan­tive ap­point­ment as a High Court judge in the crim­i­nal di­vi­sion where I have been for some eight years."

Car­mona stat­ed in the doc­u­ment: "I have been a judge of the High Court for some eight years, deal­ing with com­plex crim­i­nal tri­als of great na­tion­al no­to­ri­ety. I do not run with hounds and fox­es in dis­pens­ing jus­tice. My in­tegri­ty re­mains unim­peach­able."I have pros­e­cut­ed suc­cess­ful­ly a se­nior mag­is­trate who was sen­tenced to two years' hard labour for cor­rup­tion. I ex­er­cise my re­spon­si­bil­i­ty with­out fear or favour."

Car­mona said it would not be dif­fi­cult to take up a po­si­tion on any mat­ter in­de­pen­dent of, and pos­si­bly con­trary to, his gov­ern­ment, as the Gov­ern­ment would be aware of the im­por­tance of be­ing in­de­pen­dent and the need to sup­port ICC statutes and rules.

He said he al­so pros­e­cut­ed a jus­tice of the peace who was sen­tenced to ten years for cor­rup­tion.He said he had been a one-man dis­ci­pli­nary tri­bunal where he found guilty the chief ad­min­is­tra­tor of the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly of mis­con­duct in of­fice. Car­mona said the per­son lost his job.He said he al­so pros­e­cut­ed se­nior civil­ian ser­vants and oth­er lawyers for crim­i­nal of­fences."Liv­ing in a small coun­try places im­mense pres­sure on one's ca­pac­i­ty to be in­de­pen­dent. Dur­ing my ca­reer not on­ly have I in­voked the in­de­pen­dence of the of­fice I oc­cu­pied I al­so prac­tice it un­flinch­ing­ly," he added.

Car­mona was asked if he could par­tic­i­pate in a ju­di­cial de­ci­sion in­volv­ing a mat­ter in which his Gov­ern­ment had an in­ter­est.He said: "I have to live up to the man­date as­cribed to judges. One is al­ways as a judge non-po­lit­i­cal and looks at the mer­its of the mat­ter. One's ap­point­ment and tenure fur­ther sup­ports one's in­de­pen­dence."He said he had once giv­en a writ­ten judg­ment on re­cusal in a con­tract mur­der tri­al where his life was threat­ened by the leader of a crim­i­nal gang and par­tic­u­lar in­for­ma­tion came to his knowl­edge which "un­wit­ting­ly was pub­lished by the press and I felt look­ing at the law on re­cusal and the cir­cum­stances, that fair­ness de­mand­ed my re­cusal."Car­mona added:"Gov­ern­ments do con­sist of politi­cians who come and go. Politi­cians en­joy a tran­sient ex­is­tence. The rule of law and due process are sacro­sanct."