WESTERN BUREAU:Prominent Montego Bay-based attorney-at-law, Nathan Robb, is calling for the establishing of a regional Supreme Court in western Jamaica to better facilitate residents, primarily with civil cases.
Robb says that, for many decades, it has been too difficult and financially burdensome for the poorer class of people to travel to Kingston to have their cases heard or tried, but found it even more frustrating whenever their cases are being constantly postponed and take years before they are resolved.
"The laws that are practised in the Resident Magistrate's Courts are no different from those practised in the Supreme Court. The only thing is the money restriction," Robb said. He said he believed that, if the jurisdictions of the RM courts were extended, particularly in civil matters, the process would be less frustrating.
"Any reform of the justice system that we are thinking of, we need to seriously accept the fact that Jamaica is no longer Kingston."
Robb was making a contribution to the Jamaican Justice System Reform forum at the Civic Centre in Montego Bay last week. The Justice Ministry is holding a series of forums across the island to solicit the public's views on how the justice system can be improved.
Director of reform in the Ministry of Justice, Canute Brown, an attorney, said he was convinced that regionalising the Supreme Court was certainly on the cards. "If it is regionalised, then the Resident Magistrates would not complain if people could have access to the Supreme Court much easier.
On the review of the Justice Reform System, the National Task Force, headed by Professor Barry Chevannes, will analyse the recommendations and put them forward to the Government for a review process.
Brown said the concerns raised at the forum existed for years, such as the increase in fines.
"We have been urging Government to review some mechanism to review fines, but there has to be a concerted effort by state functionaries who have the responsibility of revising the laws tolook at the issues," Brown said.
- N.T
