Velma Hylton, Contributor
THE DEPARTMENT of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) is not the private backyard of anyone.
I have tried my best to ignore what has been reported in the press over the past months about happenings in that department but I cannot remain silent any longer.
The office of the DPP is the foremost legal department in any jurisdiction that recognises that the rule of law is paramount in any civilised state as I always assumed Jamaica to be.
I joined the department in the glory days of that department during the tenure of that most illustrious of jurists, James Sewell Kerr, Q.C., and spent 12 years and nine months of my most memorable years as a lawyer there.
Mr. Kerr, having vacationed briefly, went on to higher heights but the department maintained its stellar stature under his successor in title.
He, I am sure, will agree with me that Mr. Kerr's shoes were a little big and therefore they did not fit as comfortably as when worn by the Big Man himself, but no one outside of that building was ever aware that he sometimes had to step carefully as he was a gentleman and the other members of the department supported him absolutely and totally.
During the glory days, it was well-known that each and every one of the several counsel in the department had the full backing of the director and we all went into court or made our various rulings and signed for the director because we knew we gave it 150 per cent, not because he expected it of us, but because we knew we could do no less when we had him firmly behind us.
Some of the most memorable occasions for me was when he held sway in the common lunch room on any occasion that there was a case or an authority of note that he wished to discuss with us to bring us all up to his level... (though that was in vain hope) or simply to inform us of some noteworthy comment from himself or a Law Lord on his return from one of his frequent trips to Her Majesty's Privy Council.
I well recall his informing us in his inimitable manner of the query from a Law Lord when he was arguing the case of Sigismund Palmer v R. for Murder. The Law Lord wanted to know what was meant by "Ganga legge legge" ... and with expansive arms he said....simple. it means "openly and in large quantities".
Being ordered
After such encounters with our director, it was with horror that I read today (Friday) that the circuit court sitting at Falmouth had to be adjourned because the current director summarily ordered the Prosecuting Counsel to return to office without a replacement being sent.
In 11 years and nine months I spent one year in the BVI. I never received one single order from our director, but when he walked into my chambers and said "Isn't she looking good these days", and I said "What would you like me to do for you sir?" I would have remained in the Home Circuit Court or gone to one country circuit after another without the customary one-week break without even asking why... but then I would not need to because any time I was called upon to do a bit extra I would always be told why without asking... and it never would even occur to me to ask why as I always knew that our director did nothing without an absolutely good reason because he was and remains a gentleman who I now have the honour to call friend.
The successor to our director was no different... if there was a matter that he wished to discuss with you or to inform you of he would do so personally whether you were in chambers or out in the country but never, repeat never, did he ever issue an order.
He recognised that we were all counsel working with the people of Jamaica who expected us to give of our best and we did.
Holder of the office
I read with some amazement recently that it was being said or reported to a columnist of the Sunday Herald that Deputy Directors or Senior Deputy Directors (there were no senior directors up to when I went on secondment in March 1984), do not go to circuit court but concentrate on important matters before the Magistrates Courts (if I remember rightly).
I was the first female deputy DPP in Jamaica and someone seems to have omitted to instruct the then director that I should not be assigned to Circuit Court but should be given the lesser assignment of prosecuting in the Magistrates Court.
Let the record show that between June 1971 and March 1984 when I left the Office of the DPP on secondment to Grenada, I was assigned to the Magistrates Court on only three, repeat three, occasions and none of those times was while I was acting as Deputy DPP or after I was confirmed in the post with effect from 1st March, 1978... I appeared constantly in the Supreme Court... Home Circuit and country circuits and also in the Court of Appeal... So much so that on one occasion when I was large in size a judge of the Court of Appeal, who shall be nameless, told me to ask the DPP not to give me any more court assignments.
The judge thought I was ill or not feeling up to it... I had a good laugh at him behind his back because I never felt better in my life than at the particular point, of course I said nothing to the DPP as I had no wish to be removed from court.
I regret that somebody lied to the columnist or he is gravely mistaken as to what he was told.
A properly functioning DPP is as important to the maintenance of law and order and the rule of law... as is the collective breath we breathe and if somebody somewhere does not recognise that once majestic department where we all stood as tall as our director even if one or other of us only measured 5ft 2ins, then we shall wake up one rainy morning or bright sunny day to discover that our hard fought for Independence is meaningless and that for the latter very few years of our 40 years of Independence we have been going backwards to a new colonialism... one where the rule of law, and law and order are meaningless.
Could not happen
During my sojourn away from Jamaica when anything untoward happened I used to comment... almost beating my chest... That could never happen in Jamaica... but now having read on many occasions what has been happening in the Jamaican DPP, I shall have to buy a round trip ticket to all the islands in which I worked, apologise to them and say... it happens in Jamaica... now.
May God have mercy on us as no one else seems to care ... that the freedoms our ancestors fought to secure are slowly being trampled to the extent that a judge of the Supreme Court and jurors can be told without being told... You don't matter take a rest until I say when.
Velma Hylton, Q.C., was counsel for the Commission of Enquiry in the police-military operation in West Kingston last year.
