CRAWFORDBarbara Gayle, Staff Reporter
THE UNITED Kingdom Privy Council has ruled that the Court of Appeal did not have the power to bar Donovan Crawford, former head of the Century financial entities, from appealing to the Privy Council against a $2.2 billion judgment awarded in favour of the Government-owned Financial Institutions Services (FIS).
Crawford and his companies, which have now been given the go ahead to appeal their case, were barred by the Court of Appeal from going to the Privy Council, because they had failed to comply with a Court of Appeal order to pay $7.6 million in legal fees to lawyers representing the FIS before they could get final leave to appeal.
The effect of the Privy Council's ruling handed down Thursday, is that a litigant should not be barred from pursuing an appeal, because of failure to comply with a court order to pay legal fees to the respondent's lawyers.
After reviewing the Constitution and the Jamaica Appeals Procedure Order, the Privy Council said that the Court of Appeal did not have the power to bar Crawford from pursuing his appeal because he had complied with the necessary conditions.
The Privy Council said also that the "Court of Appeal is not entitled to exercise its inherent power to impose further conditions or make further orders which restrict the right of appeal given by Section 110 (1)(a)" of the Constitution.
"Whether the Court of Appeal should have greater powers to impose conditions on a party seeking leave to appeal to the Judicial Committee is not a matter for their Lordships but for the legislature of Jamaica," the Privy Council held.
On October 8, 2001, the Court of Appeal granted conditional leave for Crawford to appeal against a Court of Appeal ruling, upholding a Supreme Court order that Crawford and his companies should pay loans and interest totalling about $2.2 billion to FIS.
After Crawford was granted conditional leave, FIS applied to the Court of Appeal and obtained an order from Mr. Justice Henderson Downer that Crawford's proceedings to the Privy Council should be stayed until he paid legal costs of $7.6 million to FIS' lawyers. Crawford applied to the Court of Appeal on April 12, 2002 to set aside Mr. Justice Downer's order but was unsuccessful.
On November 18, 2002, the Court of Appeal rescinded Crawford's conditional leave to appeal to the Privy Council. Attorney-at-law Oswald James, who is representing Crawford, told the court then that Crawford was unable to pay the legal fees.
Crawford applied to the Privy Council for special leave to appeal. The petition came for hearing on January 14 this year but, because of the importance of the issues raised, the Privy Council ordered that the application for special leave should be heard by a full board, comprising five members instead of a three-member board.
The Privy Council said that there appeared to be "considerable force" in the argument by FIS that the petitioners "are impecunious and undeserving litigants (the first petitioner having taken up residence in a jurisdiction in which Jamaican judgments cannot be enforced against him), their Lordships nevertheless consider that this is not a case where the appeal is wholly devoid of merit."
The petitioners are Donovan Crawford, his mother Alma Crawford and Regardless Limited, one of Crawford's companies.
