High Court judge Vasheist Kokaram has thrown out a bid by mem­bers of Lev Tahor, an ul­tra-Or­tho­dox Jew­ish sect, who are chal­leng­ing their con­tin­ued de­ten­tion af­ter be­ing re­fused en­try by im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cials at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port on Mon­day.In dis­miss­ing the law­suit yes­ter­day, Kokaram said the claim and ev­i­dence filed by the group's lo­cal le­gal rep­re­sen­ta­tive, Farai Ma­sai­sai, on Wednes­day, were vague and filled with pro­ce­dur­al deficits which caused them to fail."Be­fore we reach why they are be­ing de­tained, we have to ask our­selves why they were here in the first place," Kokaram said.Ma­sai­sai's claim that he was not al­lowed to com­mu­ni­cate prop­er­ly with his clients at their ho­tel, which he said ham­pered his abil­i­ty to ob­tain the nec­es­sary in­struc­tions and doc­u­ments, was not sup­port­ed by ev­i­dence, the judge said.

De­spite their le­gal de­feat, Kokaram told the group's at­tor­neys to re­turn to their clients to ob­tain more de­tailed in­struc­tions be­fore re­fil­ing the law­suit. He al­so warned Chief Im­mi­gra­tion Of­fi­cer Kei­th Samp­son, who was present in court, to tell his of­fi­cers not to bar the at­tor­neys' meet­ing with the group. Kokaram al­so said there was no ev­i­dence pre­sent­ed which sup­port­ed the group's claim that they were be­ing kept in in­hu­mane con­di­tions at the air­port and at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Ho­tel. Their on­ly al­le­ga­tion on the is­sue, he not­ed, was that they were on­ly tak­en to the ho­tel and giv­en a meal more than 24 hours af­ter be­ing re­fused en­try.

No ev­i­dence to­sup­port claim

He raised is­sue with Ma­sai­sai's in­abil­i­ty to im­me­di­ate­ly pro­vide doc­u­men­tary ev­i­dence of the parental rights of six of the group's mem­bers, who are be­tween nine and 16. Be­cause of the cir­cum­stances in the case and the pos­si­bil­i­ty that the rights of mi­nors and adults might be in­ter­twined, he said, they might need sep­a­rate at­tor­neys. "We must en­sure the mi­nors are aware of what is hap­pen­ing. The court must be sat­is­fied that the mi­nors' in­ter­ests are be­ing heard and pro­tect­ed," Kokaram said.Dur­ing the short hear­ing in the Port-of-Spain High Court, the group's at­tor­neys al­so con­tend­ed that the pro­ce­dure used in re­fus­ing the group en­try was im­prop­er, as they on­ly speak French but doc­u­ments giv­en to them were in Eng­lish. Kokaram al­so re­ject­ed this sub­mis­sion be­cause of a lack of ev­i­dence.

In re­sponse to the claim, lawyers from the of­fice of the So­lic­i­tor Gen­er­al main­tained the State did not have to jus­ti­fy the group's de­ten­tion, as they were not be­ing kept by the State but rather by West Jet, the air­line they ar­rived on and would be de­part­ing on. The State was rep­re­sent­ed by Paul Is­sac and San­jeev Lal­la.Ac­cord­ing to the lim­it­ed ev­i­dence filed be­fore Kokaram, four of the chil­dren and one of the adults have Is­raeli cit­i­zen­ship, two of the mi­nors, both 16, are Amer­i­cans and the oth­er two adults are Cana­di­an. Their at­tor­neys con­firmed they were en route to Guatemala when they were stopped by lo­cal im­mi­gra­tion au­thor­i­ties.