Two relatives of Princes Town have partially succeeded in their appeal against being convicted of failing to abide by an order from the Town and Country Planning Division to demolish unapproved construction work to their property.
Chandra and Ingrid Silochan, of Craignish Village, Princes Town, scored the minor legal victory as their appeal was partially upheld by Appellate Judges Mark Mohammed and Prakash Moosai, yesterday morning.
According to the evidence in the case, in April 2002, the Silochans applied to the division for planning permission to develop a single story home on their property in Champ Fleurs into multiple apartments and were refused.
The division began investigating the property after the received reports that construction was continuing despite the lack of permission.
On November 21, 2005, the division’s development control inspector Rickie Cedeno served the Silochans with an enforcement notice to demolish the unapproved additions.
The division waited three years and then chose to file enforcement proceedings after there was still no compliance.
In early 2017, former magistrate and current High Court Judge Lisa Ramsumair-Hinds found the Silochans guilty of the offence.
The Silochans were fined $700 for the initial breach when the enforcement notice took effect on January 17, 2006.
As they had not complied with the order while the case was ongoing, they were also slapped with a fine of $815,200, which was calculated at $200 per day for 4,076 days between 2006 and 2017.
In the appeal the Silochan’s attorneys claimed that the conviction for the initial breach should be overturned as it was statue barred because it was brought well over six months after their initial breach of the order.
Moosai, who wrote the judgment, agreed that the offence for the initial offence was time-barred.
However, he ruled that their conviction for the continuing element of the offence between 2006 and 2017 was legitimate due to the continued non-compliance.
Moosai also rejected the relatives complaints over the failure of the then magistrate to give sufficient reasons for her decision in the case.
“Her decision was reasonably intelligible to the appellants, even though they considered it to be erroneous, and provided the basis for meaningful appellate review of both conviction and sentence,” he said.
Dealing with the duo’s complaints over the severity of their sentence, Moosai noted that the sentences were properly calculated.
However, he questioned the magistrate’s order that they should serve two years in prison with hard labour if they failed to pay the fine.
“I am of the view in these circumstances, imprisonment with hard labour in the instance of default is unwarranted, disproportionate and excessive,” Moosai said, as she adjusted the default sentence to simple imprisonment.
As part of the judgement, Moosai gave the relatives 90 days in which to pay the fines.
The Silochans were represented by Gilbert Peterson, SC, Terrance Bharath, and Vahni Seunath while Nigel Pilgrim represented the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).
