Derek Achong

The Ju­di­cia­ry has ex­tend­ed con­do­lences to the fam­i­ly of for­mer Ap­peal Court Judge An­dre des Vi­gnes, who passed away on Mon­day morn­ing.

A re­lease is­sued late on Tues­day stat­ed that Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie, the Judges of the Supreme Court and oth­er staff were deeply sad­dened by des Vi­gnes’ pass­ing.

“The Chief Jus­tice, Judges, Ju­di­cial Of­fi­cers, Man­age­ment and Staff of the Ju­di­cia­ry ex­tend to his dear wife and chil­dren and the rest of his fam­i­ly their heart­felt con­do­lences on what we know is their deep loss and sor­row,” it said.

It stat­ed that in ad­di­tion to pro­vid­ing yeo­man ser­vice in the High Court and Court of Ap­peal, des Vi­gnes al­so served as a mem­ber of the Ju­di­cial Ed­u­ca­tion In­sti­tute of T&T (JEITT).

“His judg­ments, many of which are of land­mark im­port, were known for their clar­i­ty and dis­play of su­pe­ri­or le­gal acu­men,” it said.

De­scrib­ing des Vi­gnes as kind, hum­ble and en­gag­ing, the Ju­di­cia­ry not­ed that his pleas­ant de­meanour was ev­i­dent to Ju­di­cia­ry staff even be­fore he joined the or­gan­i­sa­tion in 2009.

“His in­ter­ac­tions then, as they were in his time on the bench, with Ju­di­cia­ry staff were al­ways cor­dial, un­fussy and kind and he showed a deep ap­pre­ci­a­tion for them and their work,” it said.

Sev­er­al so­cial jus­tice NGOs, he was in­volved with through­out his life, took to so­cial me­dia be­tween late Mon­day and Tues­day morn­ing to mourn his pass­ing.

Chair of the Catholic Com­mis­sion for So­cial Jus­tice (CC­SJ) Leela Ramdeen said she and the or­gan­i­sa­tion, of which des Vi­gnes was a found­ing mem­ber, were deeply sad­dened by the news. 

She said that he al­ways ex­ud­ed kind qual­i­ties since she knew him.

“First­ly, he was a man of deep abid­ing faith; a com­pas­sion­ate man who was com­mit­ted to the pro­mo­tion of jus­tice; a man of in­tegri­ty; a hum­ble, gen­tle and right­eous man whose amaz­ing in­tel­lect and lofty po­si­tions did not lead him to for­get the needs of the less for­tu­nate,” Ramdeen said. 

She not­ed that over the past year he as­sist­ed the or­gan­i­sa­tion in de­vel­op­ing and im­ple­ment­ing its vir­tu­al le­gal aid clin­ic. 

“In spite of his busy sched­ule, he com­mit­ted to work with us on a month­ly ba­sis to pro­vide pro bono ad­vice to those who ac­cessed the clin­ic,” Ramdeen said.

Des Vi­gnes’ fam­i­ly is still in the process of fi­nal­is­ing fu­ner­al arrange­ments.