An­na-Lisa Paul

Eleven years af­ter be­ing charged with fail­ing to de­clare a Lon­don bank ac­count to the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion, for­mer prime min­is­ter Bas­deo Pan­day was ac­quit­ted yes­ter­day of the charges. A month ago, Port-of-Spain mag­is­trate Mar­cia Mur­ray ad­journed the mat­ter to con­sid­er the ev­i­dence and de­liv­er a rul­ing on an ap­pli­ca­tion by Pan­day's lead at­tor­ney, David Aaron­berg, QC, for the mat­ter to be stayed on the ground of abuse of process.

Yes­ter­day, Mur­ray dis­charged Pan­day, say­ing: "The court is com­pelled to stop these pro­ceed­ings to pro­tect the in­tegri­ty of the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem." She ruled the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion had erred by not giv­ing Pan­day a chance to be heard be­fore a tri­bunal. That meant he was de­prived of due process of law, she added. In­stead the com­mis­sion sent the mat­ter to the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions.

Mur­ray ruled: "The mis­con­duct of the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion was so se­ri­ous that it would un­der­mine pub­lic con­fi­dence in the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem and bring it in­to dis­re­pute. "The court is there­fore com­pelled to stop these pro­ceed­ings to pro­tect the in­tegri­ty of the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem." Mur­ray de­liv­ered her rul­ing in less than five min­utes when the mat­ter was called in the First Mag­is­trates' Court as she read from the 19-page judge­ment.

Pan­day, who was seat­ed in the pris­on­er dock, did not re­act. But when he emerged from the court­room, with his daugh­ter, Mick­ela, a smil­ing Pan­day said: "Af­ter all these years of strug­gle, I have ex­pe­ri­enced all things, all the ups and downs. My lawyers have done their work and I am re­al­ly grate­ful for that."

He said he was con­fi­dent the ap­pli­ca­tion to stay the mat­ter would be grant­ed af­ter hear­ing Aaron­berg's sub­mis­sions on the last oc­ca­sion. Aaron­berg had ar­gued that Pan­day was "sin­gled out" and used as a po­lit­i­cal foot­ball and the in­ves­ti­ga­tor failed to com­plete per­ti­nent checks which was un­fair to Pan­day. Pan­day was be­fore Mur­ray for re­tri­al for al­leged­ly fail­ing to de­clare a Lon­don bank ac­count, con­trary to the In­tegri­ty in Pub­lic Life Act.

He was ac­cused of fail­ing to dis­close the ac­count at Na­tion­al West­min­ster Bank Plc, Wim­ble­don, Lon­don, to the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion for the years 1997, 1998 and 1999. In March 2006, Pan­day was found guilty and sen­tenced by Chief Mag­is­trate Sher­man Mc Nicolls to two years in prison.

Pan­day ap­pealed that de­ci­sion and the con­vic­tion was quashed and a re­tri­al or­dered, which was up­held on ap­peal to the Privy Coun­cil. State pros­e­cu­tor Tim­o­thy Cas­sel, QC, had dis­missed ar­gu­ments Pan­day had not been treat­ed fair­ly and said it was the court's du­ty to try him and the court's sense of pro­pri­ety and jus­tice would be of­fend­ed if the State had not done so.

Yes­ter­day's rul­ing was de­liv­ered in the ab­sence of Aaron­berg and Cas­sel, who are both in Eng­land. Asked what he in­tend­ed to do now the mat­ter was fi­nal­ly over, Pan­day said: "I am work­ing and en­joy­ing my­self. I am hav­ing fun." Mick­ela Pan­day ex­pressed re­lief that the mat­ter was over, say­ing:

"It has been an emo­tion­al, fi­nan­cial and phys­i­cal strain on us. I am re­lieved it is over and jus­tice has pre­vailed. I am pleased with the de­ci­sion and the truth has come out." Un­able to say what the State's next move would be un­til af­ter dis­cus­sions with the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions, at­tor­ney An­ju Bho­la, who ap­peared along­side Cas­sel and Renu­ka Ramb­ha­jan, de­clined com­ment.

Soon af­ter leav­ing the court, Pan­day went to the Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex, Mt Hope, to vis­it his broth­er, Sub­has, who was un­der­go­ing tests. Sub­has Pan­day could not be reached for com­ment.

Mur­ray's rul­ing:

"In cas­es of false de­c­la­ra­tions made un­der the act, the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion plays a 'pre-pros­e­cu­tion' role in that on­ly af­ter it has con­duct­ed its due process can it re­fer per­sons to the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions. "For these pur­pos­es, the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion is a crit­i­cal part of the Ex­ec­u­tive which makes the de­ci­sion to pros­e­cute.

"The In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion failed to com­ply with the pro­vi­sions of the act un­der which it is con­sti­tut­ed when it did not ad­vise the Pres­i­dent to ap­point a tri­bunal to en­quire in­to Mr Pan­day's de­c­la­ra­tions. "Mr Pan­day was not giv­en an op­por­tu­ni­ty, to which he was en­ti­tled, to be heard by a prop­er­ly con­sti­tut­ed tri­bunal.

"The re­fer­ral of Mr Pan­day's de­c­la­ra­tions to the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions was there­fore ill con­ceived and it mat­ters not that the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions found there was suf­fi­cient ev­i­dence to lay the charges. " In the court's view, fail­ing to ac­cord Mr Pan­day due process un­der the act amounts to mis­con­duct on the part of the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion.

"The mis­con­duct by the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion was very se­ri­ous. The sub­stance of these charges was the 'fruit of the poi­son tree' which was the prod­uct of the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion's mis­con­duct. "Fur­ther­more, with­out the prod­uct of the mis­con­duct, these pro­ceed­ings would not have arisen. "It is the court's view that the mis­con­duct of the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion was so se­ri­ous that it would un­der­mine pub­lic con­fi­dence in the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem and bring it in­to dis­re­pute.