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The OECS Court of Appeal has turned down yet another move by the Bernard Coard Gang of Prisoners in Grenada to be released from the Richmond Hill prison.

In a decision handed down Monday in Castries, St. Lucia, the court brushed aside the latest court action by Coard and company as a "further collateral attack" on the former Court of Appeal which presided over their matter in the Maurice Bishop Murder trial in 1986.
One of the Court of Appeal Justices, Michael Gordon cited the arguments put forward on behalf of the imprisoned men as representing "a misuse of the court's constitutional jurisdiction".

According to Gordon, the OECS Court of Appeal has no jurisdiction to enquire into matters adjudicated upon by the former court. "I am in full agreement.... that as these matters were canvassed before the former Court of Appeal, this precludes the applicants (Coard and Company) from seeking to have (new) Courts examine the issues afresh", he said.

The latest court case involves an appeal by the State of Grenada against a ruling in March 2004 by Guyanese high court judge, Kenneth Benjamin that the death sentence imposed on the prisoners was "unconstitutional and illegal".

Justice Benjamin also ruled that the prisoners should be brought before a judge of the high court for proper sentencing. Coard, the former deputy Prime Minister of the ill-fated 1979-83 leftist People's Revolutionary Government (PRG) was sentenced along with fourteen other government and military officials for the murder of Prime Minister Maurice Bishop on October 19, 1983.

The trial was heard in a high court which Coard and Bishop created to replace the constitutionally-recognised court of Grenada which owed its existence on "the doctrine of necessity". The Grenada Revolutionary leaders were forced to set up their own court system after the OECS court pulled out of the island in the wake of the suspension of the Grenada constitution by the PRG.

As part of his ruling, Gordon described as "another collateral attack" the arguments put forward by lawyers representing the Grenada prisoners that the Court of Appeal has the power to further enquire into whether the constitutional rights of the Coard Gang were breached on the important issue of jury selection.

Bernard Coard The Court of Appeal judge also commented on the contention of the prisoners that the death sentence imposed upon them in the previous court was "unconstitutional and illegal". He noted that the defendants had articulated that despite the conclusive nature of the proceedings and the dismissal of their appeal against conviction and sentence, they nonetheless had a right to rely on "subsequent judicial decisions" in their matter.

"By that language I understand them to be acknowledging that they have had the benefit of, and exhausted, all of the opportunities of appeal available to them in a criminal trial and that they are seeking to tread that very narrow path around issue estoppel amongst other things", he remarked.

Justice Gordon ruled that the conviction of the Coard Gang cannot be considered in terms of the ruling which the Privy Council in London handed down in the Pratt and Morgan case from Jamaica.

The Privy Council ruled that if a person was on death row for five years without the death sentence being carried out then the State is duty-bound to lesser the sentence to life imprisonment. According to Justice Gordon, the Grenada prisoners have already had their death sentences commuted to life imprisonment.

"....Even if the sentence of death was a live issue, which it is not, by analogy with the ruling in Pratt and Morgan this Court would be minded to do the same. In other words, the issue is academic and as such does not justify the 'collateral attack" as a means of circumventing the doctrine of issue estoppel", he said.

Justice Gordon also commented on a petition filed by the prisoners before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council for special leave to appeal against the decision of the former Court of Appeal dismissing their motion for declarations challenging the constitutionality of that court and the then high court.

He recalled that the Committee found that People's Law No. 84, passed by the restored Grenada parliament had properly been passed in the context of the Grenada constitution. Lord Diplock who handed down the ruling on behalf of the Judicial Committee indicated that the words of People's Law 84 which purport to abolish appeals to the Privy Council "are in absolute and unambigious terms".

Similar sentiments were expressed by another member of the Court of Appeal, Justice Brian Alleyne on the clear attempt by the Coard Gang to have another court review their matter. He pointed to an earlier ruling by the OECS Court of Appeal that it has no jurisdiction to hear, re-hear, determine or redetermine matters which were heard and determined by the former Court of appeal before its abolition.

Alleyne said: "...I hold that this court has no jurisdiction to hear, re-hear, determine or redetermine the matters which were raised in the High Court and on appeal in this court, and in any event that the (Coard Gang) are estopped from relitigating the matters which are the subject of this appeal.

"I agree with learned counsel for the appellant (State of Grenada) that to entertain these matters would be to entertain an appeal from the decisions of the former Court of Appeal", he added.

The case for the State was argued by former Trinidad and Tobago Attorney-General, Karl Hudson-Phillip and Rohan Phillip which the lawyers for the Coard Gang were Keith Scotland, Cajeton Hood, Ruggles Ferguson and Derek Sylvester.