The contestations and blame game going on between two of the major constitutional pillars of the law in Trinidad and Tobago, the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Chief Justice, is indicative of and a core reason for the inability of the State to counter the raging criminality which has been mauling the population of this country.
This editorial is not an attempt to unravel the claims and counters and enter into the who’s right and who’s wrong claims of Chief Justice Ivor Archie and DPP Roger Gaspard about the inability to bring the accused persons to face trial for the 10-year-old murder of attorney Dana Seetahal SC.
That delay is made even more inexcusable, as Ms Seetahal was said to have been closing in on elements of the leaders of the criminal cartel operating here with impunity. Allegedly, it was a case of preventing and silencing Ms Seetahal from turning up information on those hidden in the shadows of serious crimes.
Instead of the prosecution system being efficient and effective in having major sponsors of crime unmasked and put out of their operations, the ongoing blame game and the tossing of responsibility between the two offices are, in fact, now favouring the criminals.
The free pass from effective and timely prosecution must also frustrate the efforts of the police, who have generally been blamed for being ineffective.
What the confused bickering between the two officials also means is that instead of cracking open the Seetahal murder case to the point of getting even closer to those who planned and carried out her execution, the long delay without prosecution has given time and space for the gangsters outside the prison system to work at hiding their trails.
The point is that the conflicting claims between the two major officeholders are retarding rather than advancing prosecution; and deep implications for the continuing failures of the criminal justice system are involved.
It is frightening that in the circumstances, there has been talk about “the near collapse of the criminal justice system” in a generalised manner. If such claims have any credence, we are crossing a major red line.
Assuming that central to the issue of the delay is the need to adopt the correct procedure with regard to getting the matter into court, is it against the law for there to be communication between the Judiciary and the DPP’s office to resolve this difficulty? Why does it have to reach this point, where there is an open conflict of views between the two?
Whether the usual contentions about the shortage of resources in the criminal justice system directly affect this particular case, raising them brings the Government and the Cabinet into the picture.
Over the past ten years, billions have gone to the Ministry of National Security, while the Judiciary constantly complains not only about the need for increased resources but the indirect manner of the disbursement.
Whether the resources allocated and given have been effectively used and efficiently managed by the two constitutional authorities is another issue.
In all of this, an irresistible concern of citizens besieged by crime is to wonder if there are deliberate attempts to keep the general criminal justice system inefficient and ineffective.