RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

For­mer Jus­tice min­is­ter Prakash Ra­mad­har has come out in de­fence of the Ju­di­cia­ry, warn­ing that al­le­ga­tions against ju­di­cial of­fi­cers must be ground­ed in ev­i­dence and due process, as pub­lic de­bate con­tin­ues over in­tel­li­gence re­ports al­leg­ing that a mag­is­trate was in­volved in mon­ey laun­der­ing and formed part of an al­leged con­spir­a­cy.

Speak­ing at a me­dia con­fer­ence in San Fer­nan­do yes­ter­day, Ra­mad­har said while any­one found guilty of wrong­do­ing should face the full force of the law, un­sub­stan­ti­at­ed al­le­ga­tions could cause last­ing dam­age to pub­lic con­fi­dence in the Ju­di­cia­ry, one of the coun­try’s most im­por­tant de­mo­c­ra­t­ic in­sti­tu­tions.

“Facts are im­por­tant. Sus­pi­cion is ram­pant. Al­le­ga­tions are free and cheap, but the con­se­quences are ex­pen­sive,” Ra­mad­har said.

He de­scribed the Ju­di­cia­ry as “the one in­sti­tu­tion that we must pro­tect with all of our strength and with our lives,” ar­gu­ing that at a time when con­fi­dence in many State in­sti­tu­tions has de­clined, the courts re­main the ul­ti­mate safe­guard for de­ter­min­ing truth and jus­tice.

“It is to the courts that we must look for that sober­ing re­set­tling of what is right, what is wrong, what is true and what is false,” he added.

He cau­tioned that any at­tempt to un­der­mine the courts, “even by law en­force­ment,” should be treat­ed se­ri­ous­ly.

Ra­mad­har, who has prac­tised law for decades, said judges and mag­is­trates of­ten pre­side over mat­ters in which one par­ty in­evitably leaves dis­sat­is­fied.

“There’s al­ways a win­ner and a los­er in court,” he said.

“And some­times the losers are very an­gry and very up­set and will find every rea­son to try to blame some­one as to why that de­ci­sion did not come in their favour.”

While stress­ing he hoped that was not the case in the present mat­ter, Ra­mad­har, who was ac­com­pa­nied by act­ing Chief Mag­is­trate Bri­an De­bideen and at­tor­neys Michael Rooplal and Vis­han Gir­war at the brief­ing, urged the me­dia and pub­lic to care­ful­ly ex­am­ine the cas­es ref­er­enced in the in­tel­li­gence re­port be­fore draw­ing con­clu­sions.

He main­tained that if ev­i­dence emerged prov­ing wrong­do­ing, he would sup­port le­gal ac­tion.

“If there’s ev­i­dence, I’ll be the first to con­demn him. If there’s a pros­e­cu­tion to fol­low, we’ll be there stand­ing.”

How­ev­er, he warned that al­le­ga­tions alone should nev­er be treat­ed as proof of guilt.

“Not every pros­e­cu­tion ends with a con­vic­tion. Not every pros­e­cu­tion is whole­some. Not every pros­e­cu­tion is with the right in­ten­tion.”

Draw­ing on his ex­pe­ri­ence as a crim­i­nal at­tor­ney, Ra­mad­har re­ferred to sev­er­al high-pro­file crim­i­nal mat­ters in which he said false wit­ness­es or fab­ri­cat­ed ev­i­dence were ul­ti­mate­ly ex­posed dur­ing tri­al.

He ar­gued those cas­es demon­strate why al­le­ga­tions should al­ways be test­ed in court rather than ac­cept­ed at face val­ue.

He al­so ex­pressed con­cern about the im­pact of so­cial me­dia, say­ing al­le­ga­tions can spread rapid­ly be­fore the facts are es­tab­lished.

He not­ed that short­ly af­ter re­ports emerged, on­line com­men­tary had al­ready la­belled the un­named ju­di­cial of­fi­cer a “cor­rupt mag­is­trate.”

Ra­mad­har said his le­gal team was not at­tempt­ing to in­ter­fere with any in­ves­ti­ga­tion but want­ed to en­sure that al­le­ga­tions were sub­ject­ed to prop­er scruti­ny.

Asked whether the al­le­ga­tions rep­re­sent­ed an­oth­er at­tack on pub­lic con­fi­dence in State in­sti­tu­tions, Ra­mad­har ac­knowl­edged that trust in many pub­lic bod­ies had erod­ed but in­sist­ed the Ju­di­cia­ry must re­main pro­tect­ed.

He said ju­di­cial in­de­pen­dence should not shield any­one from le­git­i­mate crit­i­cism or ac­count­abil­i­ty but should pro­tect the courts from “un­war­rant­ed at­tack.”

Ra­mad­har’s com­ments come amid re­ports that a sit­ting mag­is­trate could soon be ar­rest­ed as law en­force­ment in­ten­si­fies its in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to al­leged white-col­lar crime.

The re­port claims a se­nior mem­ber of the Ju­di­cia­ry is un­der in­ves­ti­ga­tion over claims of bribery in ex­change for favourable court rul­ings.