Derek Achong

A po­lice of­fi­cer has won his law­suit against the Of­fice of the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice over its re­fusal to grant him a retroac­tive pro­mo­tion be­cause he was con­vict­ed of as­sault­ing a col­league. 

De­liv­er­ing a writ­ten judg­ment on Wednes­day, High Court Judge Eleanor Don­ald­son-Hon­ey­well up­held Cpl Cordell Sa­landy’s law­suit over the is­sue. 

Ac­cord­ing to the ev­i­dence in the case, Sa­landy was charged with com­mon as­sault in May 2006 and was sus­pend­ed on three-quar­ter salary. 

While on sus­pen­sion, Sa­landy was suc­cess­ful in the qual­i­fy­ing ex­am for pro­mo­tion to the rank of Cor­po­ral and was placed on the mer­it list for pro­mo­tion in April 2010.

In Sep­tem­ber 2010, Sa­landy was found guilty of the of­fence and was rep­ri­mand­ed and dis­charged un­der Sec­tion 71(1)(a) of the Sum­ma­ry Courts Act. 

Sa­landy’s sus­pen­sion was not im­me­di­ate­ly lift­ed as the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PSC) ini­ti­at­ed dis­ci­pli­nary pro­ceed­ings against him in Oc­to­ber 2012. 

He was found guilty by the com­mis­sion and was fined two months’ salary. 

Sa­landy was on­ly pro­mot­ed to the rank of Cor­po­ral in May 2016 af­ter his at­tor­neys wrote the com­mis­sion­er’s of­fice over the is­sue. 

How­ev­er, his pro­mo­tion be­gan from that date and not in 2010, when he would have been pro­mot­ed along­side 300 of­fi­cer if he was not on sus­pen­sion. 

In her judg­ment, Jus­tice Don­ald­son-Hon­ey­well ruled that the com­mis­sion­er’s of­fice could not take the de­ci­sion based on the find­ings of the PSC. 

“The PSC hav­ing pe­nalised the guilty by is­su­ing the fine, it is pro­ce­du­ral­ly un­fair for the De­fen­dant to is­sue fur­ther pun­ish­ment deny­ing the claimant retroac­tive pro­mo­tion and six years of se­nior­i­ty,” she said. 

She al­so re­ject­ed the de­fence that Sa­landy could not ben­e­fit from retroac­tive pro­mo­tion like oth­er sus­pend­ed of­fi­cers as his case was not dis­missed. 

“It is clear that the de­ci­sion by a mag­is­trate to find some­one guilty, con­vict them but then rep­ri­mand and dis­charge is akin to dis­missal,” she said. 

“There is no ev­i­dence of such a prac­tice where­by, in ad­di­tion to such a penal­ty, of­fi­cers re­turn­ing af­ter rep­ri­mand and dis­charge must al­so be sub­ject­ed to dif­fer­ent treat­ment as to pro­mo­tions,” she added. 

Jus­tice Don­ald­son-Hon­ey­well ruled that the de­ci­sion was un­fair, ir­ra­tional, un­rea­son­able and im­prop­er. 

She or­dered that he be grant­ed the retroac­tive pro­mo­tion and pro­mo­tion to the rank of Sergeant as had the de­ci­sion not be made he would have been ex­empt from sit­ting that pro­mo­tion­al ex­am as he qual­i­fied as an at­tor­ney in 2013.

Sa­landy was al­so award­ed $60,000 in ex­em­plary dam­ages over what tran­spired and the com­mis­sion­er’s of­fice was or­dered to pay his le­gal costs for bring­ing the law­suit. 

Sa­landy was rep­re­sent­ed by Phillip Wil­son and Jonathan Alex­is while Keon Gon­za­les and Adi­ta Ram­du­lar rep­re­sent­ed the com­mis­sion­er’s of­fice.