Police: Investigation Found No Criminal Conduct
The police said they have ”conducted a full and comprehensive investigation” into the complaint against the President of the Court of Appeal and the Registrar of the Supreme Court by the Civil Justice Advocacy Group [CJAG], and said their investigation “found no criminal conduct.”
A police spokesperson said, “The Bermuda Police Service has conducted a full and comprehensive investigation into the complaint made against the President of the Court of Appeal and the Registrar of the Supreme Court by a number of complainants under the collective name of the ‘Civil Justice Advocacy Group’ [CJAG].
“A file was reviewed by the Director of Public Prosecutions and a decision has been taken that no prosecution will be commenced in this matter.
“The investigation determined that the President of the Court of Appeal had instructed the audio recording system to be switched off for a period of time in 2011 and 2012. This was done, with the exception of an anomalous date where the system captured a particular court matter.
“The complainant in that case was subsequently provided with an audio tape of the recording. There is no evidence that any other recordings were made in respect of other cases that form the CJAG complaint. It follows that audio recordings were not ‘withheld or destroyed,’ because they did not exist in the first place.
“There is no legislative requirement to audio record the proceedings of the courts, and the President of the Court of Appeal was within his legal rights to turn off the recording system. The investigation found no criminal conduct in the making of this decision, either on the part of the President or the Registrar.
“As such, any offences that are alleged under the Criminal Code in relation to this matter are unfounded.
“The investigation also found that, whilst audio recordings of the cases did not exist, hand written records and other documents of the Judges of the Court of Appeal are on record with the Supreme Court Registrar and remain available to the parties upon request.”
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Like asking Gosling ; Is all liquor tricky ? Of course the police can’t find anything wrong with the judges , especially if the judges by dint have to pass judgement on the police service work !
Don’t worry… There are other investigations still going on.
Hmmmm I smell something fishy. The DPP saying they decided no prosecution will be done in this matter. Doesn’t mean something was or was not done right.
By all legal terms, nothing was done wrong. Audio recording of court proceedings are not mandatory (probably cause the system doesn’t work 100%), so if a request is made to obtain an audio recording of a case where the case was not audio recorded, how can that recording be provided. As they stated, though, the written records were available. Until such time as it is mandatory for court proceedings to be recorded audibly, then there is no legal requirement to provide recordings when they don’t exist. course for that to happen they will need a system that works all the time, otherwise case will be postponed every time the system is down.
The law here, is laid out on a most skewed track. Our court system should be seen as a place of true justice, and because rulings can effect life, a way to revisit a hearing is paramount! Petition the Governor for change, to bring the Court of Appeals in line with Magistrates and the Supreme Court!