Who will pay this judgment?

January 12, 2014, By chris, Filed Under Features/Columnists, Peeping Tom, Source

The Hon. Justice William Ramlal recently awarded judgment against the State for unlawful detention of a man by the police. The man’s vehicle was stopped and searched by the police.  He was accosted, arrested and later taken down to the station after which he was charged with various traffic offences which were subsequently dismissed.

The man then filed an action in the High Court seeking damages. He won his case and was granted judgment in excess of two million Guyana dollars. The unprofessional conduct of one particular police rank led to this award which will now see the police having to fork out this huge sum to compensate the plaintiff.

This decision of the Court was not controversial nor was it a landmark ruling. It merely reaffirmed the long held position that before the police can undertake a search of a person or a vehicle there must be probable cause or reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.

Unfortunately in Guyana, the police for too long have been operating as if they had an untrammeled right to stop, search and detain any person or vehicle. Through this ruling they have now been properly advised as to the grounds upon which they can stop, search and detain a vehicle.

The judge is reported to have ruled that under certain specified sections of the Police Act, the police have no powers to stop, search, arrest and detain any citizen unless the police have reasonable grounds to suspect that prohibited or stolen goods are being carried; unless a person whom the police reasonably suspects to have committed an indictable offence will be found; unless the police have credible and reliable information that someone has committed an summary or indictable offence will be found or unless an indictable offence has been committed in the view and presence of the police. This is a very sound ruling and should help make citizens better aware of their rights.

It was the highly unprofessional actions of a member of the police force that led the plaintiff to file the civil action against the State. A police rank was said to have pointed his gun at the plaintiff and to have indicated that the weapon was all the authority he, the rank, needed to stop and arrest the plaintiff. As a result of this action, the taxpayers of this country now have to find over two million dollars to settle the judgment.

In the old days, civil servants guilty of such unprofessional conduct would have been surcharged. It is not clear whether this will be done in this instance or whether the rank implicated in the violation of the rights of the plaintiff will get off scot-free. Regardless of who pays the award, disciplinary action needs to be taken against the offending rank.

In fact, there should be in place an automatic system where so long as it is ruled by a Court that a rank has been engaged in unprofessional conduct, that rank should be subject to a disciplinary hearing. The findings of this hearing should then be forwarded to the Police Service Commission for a decision as to what form of disciplinary action should be taken. The Guyana Police Force should not have to await public demands for the offending rank to be disciplined; there should be an automatic process that kicks in.

A few months ago, a person charged with shooting another man walked free from a charge of murder because of the absence of police witnesses. Now if any of these witnesses were investigating ranks or persons from the Guyana Police Force, they need to be subjected to a disciplinary hearing as to why they did not turn up to give evidence in the case. If the ranks concerned are found guilty, the findings of the disciplinary hearings should be sent to the Police Service Commission for action to be taken.

Unless members of the Guyana Police Force are held to account for their actions, there will continue to be a serious erosion of professional standards to the point where the police will begin to feel and citizens will be forced to accept, that the lawmen can act with impunity and can stop, search and detain a person or vehicles without suspicion premised on articulable and specific facts.