Former judge Marcia Ayers-Caesar and her legal team, headed by Senior Counsel Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj, have claimed that Justice David Harris made errors of law in his high court ruling against her in the case brought before him in October 2021. They claimed he failed to properly analyse and consider key pieces of evidence in arriving at the findings of fact.
The claims were made in a legal letter sent by Maharaj to the CEO of the Law Association of Trinidad and Tobago (LATT), Stacy Seeteram and council members on July 13, 2022.
Maharaj believes that the appeal "raises important issues concerning the independence of the Judiciary and the constitutional guarantee of the security of tenure of judges of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago."
Maharaj sent the letter to LATT ahead of Ayers-Caesar’s July 26 and 27 appeal hearing against the high court decision to dismiss her claim for constitutional and public law relief against the Judicial and Legal Service Commission (JLSC).
He requested from LATT that the notice of appeal and a copy of the original judgment be shared with the association’s membership under Section 5 of the Legal Profession Act, Chapter 90:03.
Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj, SC
SHIRLEY BAHADUR
"The appellant alleged in the grounds of appeal that Justice Harris failed to consider the credibility of the evidence given by the Chief Justice as against the contemporaneous documentary evidence of the WhatsApp messages sent by the appellant to her friends and her priest, together with the contemporaneous oral evidence given by the appellant in the telephone conversations with her husband–Mr Matthew Caesar–that day those contemporaneous oral and documentary evidence was not challenged by the JLSC at the trial," the letter stated.
"The appellant is contending that the trial judge made errors in the law in not analysing the evidence which was before him in accordance with the requirements of the law. The requisite law required the judge in the exercise of his fact-finding powers to weigh the credibility of the witness against the contemporaneous oral and documentary evidence and the unchallenged evidence before him. The appellant also contends that the trial judge made errors of law in holding that the Chief Justice was not acting for and on behalf of the JLSC in the statements the Chief Justice made to the Appellant at his meeting with her on the afternoon of 27th April 2017."
In a second letter to LATT, he quoted parts of a written judgment by Justice of Appeal Holdip, expediting the appeal.
"...The appeal is one of great public interest because of the parties involved and more so because of the allegations which involve high profile members of the judiciary, the JLSC and the appellant as a High Court judge and former chief magistrate," Maharaj wrote, quoting Justice Holdip.
Justice Harris in his ruling, according to Maharaj, accepted the evidence of the Chief Justice that he did not put unlawful or unfair pressure on the appellant during a meeting with Mrs Ayers-Caesar on April 27, 2017; That the JLSC did not decide that Ayers-Caesar should return to the magistracy; and that the Chief Justice did not threaten to remove the appellant from office if she did not resign.
The notice of appeal by Ayers-Caesar’s legal team was filed on November 17, 2021.
Ayers-Caesar alleged, in her claim, that she was forced to resign by Chief Justice Ivor Archie, as a High Court judge, during a meeting with the head of the judiciary on April 27, 2017. She said that she made an immediate decision to resign due to unlawful and unfair pressure put on her by the Chief Justice acting for and on behalf of the JLSC.
She alleged that the Chief Justice threatened her that if she did not resign as a judge and return to the Magistracy, steps would have been taken to remove her from office as a judge.
Ayers-Caesar also alleged that the Chief Justice told her that a press statement announcing her resignation was prepared for her to sign and that an appointment was arranged with the then president (Anthony Carmona) for her to submit her resignation. Ayers-Caesar’s resignation came just two weeks after she was appointed a High Court judge.
Maharaj's letter stated that "Justice David Harris rejected the evidence of the Chief Justice in respect of the preparation of the appellant's media statement. Justice David Harris held that the media statement of the appellant was prepaed on the instructions of the Chief Justice on the morning of 27th April, 2017, in advance of the meeting of the Chief Justice and the appellant on the afternoon of 27th April, 2017."
Before Ayers-Caesar’s resignation, there was anger among those involved in the 53 Magistrates' Court cases that were left unfinished by her promotion from Chief Magistrate to High Court judge.
Chief Justice Ivor Archie denies that he forced the former chief magistrate to resign as a High Court judge.
Archie and the JLSC claim that Ayers-Caesar’s failure to disclose her unfinished caseload possibly warranted a disciplinary inquiry.
They also allege that she resigned with the intention, at that time, to return as a magistrate to complete the part-heard cases before taking up the promotion.
Harris in his judgment in 2021 noted under the heading findings/evidence/conclusions, "At the onset, the Court states that it is the judicial function of the Court to follow the evidence to where it takes us. The submissions of the Claimant on various key factual issues call on the Court to draw inferences from ‘the facts. It is the finding of this Court that ‘the facts’ upon which several of the inferences are made by the Claimant, are, in several material particulars, erroneous. Further still, several critical inferences which this Court is called upon to draw, even if their underlying facts were accepted, are simply not the predominant inferences to be drawn from those facts."
The court concluded that neither the JLSC nor the president erred as alleged by the claimant.
