Richard Lord

High Court judge Vasheist Kokaram yes­ter­day or­dered the con­di­tion­al "dis­creet and dig­ni­fied re­lease" of Cheryl Miller, an ac­count­ing as­sis­tant at the Min­istry of Gen­der Af­fairs, from the St Ann's Psy­chi­atric Hos­pi­tal. He made the or­der af­ter pri­vate talks with at­tor­neys for her fam­i­ly and Dr Ian Hy­po­lite, med­ical chief of staff at St Ann's.

At 6 pm, Miller left the hos­pi­tal in the com­pa­ny of her sis­ter, Doreen, and at­tor­neys Stan­ley Mar­cus, SC, and Fitzger­ald Hinds. Miller, who was a pa­tient at the hos­pi­tal for more than two weeks, was placed in the cus­tody of her sis­ter, Doreen, and broth­er, Hamil­ton Gro­den.

Jus­tice Kokaram's or­der was hand­ed down dur­ing a spe­cial sit­ting at the Hall of Jus­tice for the hear­ing of a habeas cor­pus mo­tion filed by the law firm, Hinds and Com­pa­ny, on be­half of Miller and her sis­ter. Miller was rep­re­sent­ed by Mar­cus, Hinds, Mar­garet Hinds, De­bra James and Ali­cia Baksh.

Hy­po­lite was rep­re­sent­ed by Vashist Ma­haraj. The mat­ter will be heard again on Thurs­day at 10 am in the same court, when Miller is ex­pect­ed to be present. Miller was tak­en against her wish­es by med­ical of­fi­cers from her desk at the min­istry's of­fice, Tow­er D, In­ter­na­tion­al Wa­ter­front Com­plex, Wright­son Road, more than two weeks ago.

Jus­tice Kokaram's or­der states that:

• Miller be re­leased in­to the cus­tody of Doreen Miller and Hamil­ton Gro­den on or be­fore 7 pm on April 6.

• Miller be re­viewed by an in­de­pen­dent psy­chi­a­trist, to be de­ter­mined by the ap­pli­cant's at­tor­neys on or be­fore 4 pm on April 11. A copy of the med­ical re­port, if any, to be de­liv­ered in­to the cus­tody of the as­sis­tant reg­is­trar un­der con­fi­den­tial cov­er on or be­fore 4 pm on April 11.

Ma­haraj told the court that Miller was de­tained un­der Sec­tion 15 of the Men­tal Health Act. He said she was "a med­ical­ly-rec­om­mend­ed pa­tient." But Jus­tice Kokaram said the de­fence would have a sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenge seek­ing to keep her at the hos­pi­tal un­der that pro­vi­sion. He de­mand­ed that Ma­haraj jus­ti­fy keep­ing her at the hos­pi­tal un­der that pro­vi­sion.

Ma­haraj re­it­er­at­ed that Miller had a med­ical con­di­tion and it was in her best in­ter­est and the in­ter­est of the na­tion that she be treat­ed at the hos­pi­tal. Miller's at­tor­ney, Mar­cus, ob­ject­ed. He said noth­ing was med­ical­ly wrong with Miller on the day she was "ar­rest­ed and up to yes­ter­day-the day of her re­lease."

He said the lib­er­ty of his client was in­fringed and the fam­i­ly will be seek­ing to chal­lenge her de­ten­tion via a con­sti­tu­tion­al mo­tion. He was crit­i­cal of the way Miller was treat­ed at the hos­pi­tal, say­ing she was not al­lowed to read news­pa­pers. Mar­cus al­so said the de­fen­dant was in con­tempt of the court by fail­ing to heed an or­der to have Miller present at the hear­ing.

Ma­haraj, in re­sponse, said the de­fence was not served with the nec­es­sary doc­u­men­ta­tion from the ap­pli­cants. He lat­er told re­porters every­thing was done to as­sist the court in the mat­ter yes­ter­day. Mar­cus told the court: "There was no jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for keep­ing her. She was un­law­ful­ly ar­rest­ed. Her con­sti­tu­tion­al rights have been in­fringed."

Doreen Miller said the en­tire ex­pe­ri­ence had been stress­ful for her and her sis­ter and she was hap­py about the court rul­ing. Af­ter the rul­ing, Ma­haraj said the hos­pi­tal did not want to re­lease Miller be­cause it was "con­cerned about the health of the coun­try and the re­spon­si­bil­i­ties we have un­der the Men­tal Health Act to en­sure that there is prop­er care for peo­ple who are men­tal­ly ill in the so­ci­ety."

He de­clined to dis­close Miller's con­di­tion, as her rights to con­fi­den­tial­i­ty must be re­spect­ed. Mar­cus told the me­dia out­side the court that Miller's fam­i­ly was hap­py about yes­ter­day's out­come, as the court had or­dered her re­lease. Gen­der Af­fairs Min­is­ter Ver­na St Rose-Graves said on Tues­day that she took re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for the de­ci­sion to have Miller ad­mit­ted to the hos­pi­tal.

Miller's fam­i­ly and co-work­ers had been de­mand­ing her re­lease from the hos­pi­tal. On Thurs­day, they staged a protest out­side the Par­lia­ment, which is lo­cat­ed in the same build­ing as Miller's work­place.