Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi is defending the Bail (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill, 2019 which seeks to deny bail to people charged with firearms offences. This follows a press statement by the Law Association of T&T (LATT) which warns that the bail restrictions will trample on the constitutional rights of accused persons.
“I wish to openly support the Commissioner of Police Gary Griffith on his submissions as to the propriety of the Bail (Amendment) Bill. I considered the advice of the Law Association contained in its statement to be materially deficient in so far as it omits fundamental protection to safeguard constitutional rights which are contained in the Bail (Amendment) Bill. This protection involves a new Section 5 (7A) which was introduced into the law on previous amendments to bail,” Al-Rawi said.
He explained that the courts maintain a constitutional safeguarding rule to consider bail in exceptional circumstances, except for murder, treason and cases where the death penalty can be applied.
He said it is curious that some people are wrestling with this amendment when in previous amendments during the period 2005 to 2015 “there was an absolute ouster of the court’s jurisdiction to grant bail.”
The AG said: “It cannot be that this country refers to the virtues of Singapore where you can be flogged publicly for spitting on the sidewalk, or where the death penalty is applied for matters far worse than the Trinidad and Tobago circumstance and this population will not listen to the Commissioner of Police in his advocacy to protect the citizenry of Trinidad and Tobago.”
Noting that the bail restriction targets weapons of war, Al-Rawi added: “Difficult circumstances require serious effort with serious tools to do the job. A government can pass a law, the Commissioner exercises his part and the judiciary must do its part.”
He said the amendment has brought the Bail Act into a “level of constitutionality that never existed in this country as it relates to restrictions on bail” and said its time the country gets serious about criminal behaviour.