Anslem Clouden

Outspoken attorney-at-law, Anslem Clouden is calling on the Grenada Bar Association (GBA) to take the necessary steps to get controversial Jamaican Lawyer, Hugh Wildman struck off the list of practicing barristers in the Spice Isle.

In an exclusive interview Tuesday with GRENADA TODAY, Clouden said that Wildman has demonstrated behaviour that is not fitting of anyone who can be considered as to be "a brother" in the legal profession.

"It is time for the local bar (to) seek to have Mr. Wildman disbarred from practising in Grenada because of his conduct", he said. Clouden is urging the bar association under the presidency of Ruggles Ferguson of Ciboney Chambers to take the necessary steps for disciplinary action to be taken against Wildman with a view to having his name struck off the local list.

He said that Wildman's continued modus oprendi with the Keith Mitchell government of which he serves as Legal Advisor to Cabinet "is creating an embarrassment not only to the government but the entire OECS region".

"Mr. Wildman's conduct and modus oprendi seems to be a marked departure from appropriate and acceptable conduct from someone holding such high office", he said.

Clouden made mention of the ruling a few years ago from the Privy Council in London in a multi-million dollar compensation case that was won by Dipcon Engineering against government for breach of contract.

He said the Law Lords were clearly at pains to make the point that the Mitchell government was playing "fast and loose" with the local courts and its procedures in its handlnig of the Dipcon matter. According to Clouden, the Privy Council was obviously referring "to Wildman's manoeuvring at the lower (high) court and Court of Appeal".

Wildman had refused to make appearances in the matter before then high court judge and now Acting President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Brian Alleyne. It should be recalled that Alleyne had slammed the behaviour of Wildman in the criminal libel matter involving Prime Minister Mitchell and the editor of the GRENADA TODAY newspaper.

Clouden also took issue with Wildman over his latest run-in with current high court judge, Justice Davidson Baptiste who had ruled against him in a matter involving Wildman's failure to land the top job of Attorney-General of Grenada.

He faulted Wildman for accusing the judge in public of being bias because this is "an accusation that remains unfounded and without merit". The stand-off between Wildman and the judge reached a high point last week Friday when Justice Baptiste refused to preside in a court case involving the controversial Jamaican lawyer against deportation proceedings against a Guyanese national.

Clouden in expressing support for the position taken by the judge said that Justice Baptiste quite rightly refused "to give audience to Mr. Wildman and has recluse himself from matters before him in which Mr. Wildman appears".

"This indeed is unprecedented in our region and out of character with the conduct of judicial proceedings", he said. Clouden was adamant that this move by the judge is nothing but "the culmination of a period of unacceptable and demeaning conduct by Mr. Wildman that has brought the integrity and the due administration of justice into disrepute among right-thinking persons".

He stated that the judge has the full backing of the local bar, as well as the OECS Bar and the International Jurist Organisation (IJO). He disclosed that he had spoken personally with the heads of these respective organisations who have expressed shock and alarm at the behaviour of Wildman.

Clouden said: "It is as a result of a culmination of all these events that I am of the opinion that Mr. Wildman is not a fit and proper person to be associated with the Grenada Bar Association and the government of Grenada.

"And therefore, I call on Mr. Wildman to tender his resignation or else his conduct will be made known to the International Jurist community and the local bar", he added. Clouden is contending that if a high court judge is refusing to hear Wildman then his (Wildman's) services to the State becomes redundant".

He claims that Wildman by his behaviour has clearly brought the legal profession in Grenada into disrepute and "he (Wildman) should not be allowed to be a member of our fraternity". He also accused Wildman of trying to deceive the pepole of Grenada in his latest claims in a matter involving three of the seventeen persons implicated in the 1983 murder of leftist Prime Minister Maurice Bishop (See Page 11).

Clouden stressed that the Law Lords never gave reasons for the decision and that Wildman was misleading in trying to claim that the reasons advanced were the same that he had expounded upon. He gave this newspaper the copy of a letter that was sent by the prestigious law firm in England, Simon Muiuhead & Burton to local attorney, Lloyd Noel on the ruling.

"As you are aware, their Lordships' Board do not give reasons for their decision on applications for special leave to appeal and is therefore not possible to provide you with precise reasons as to why leave was refused in this matter", the English firm told Noel

Earlier in the year, a move was afoot within GBA to have Wildman struck off the list but it was put on hold based on the urging of two senior members of the profession.

Legal sources say that the two barristers felt that the ongoing saga in Trinidad and Tobago between the Chief Justice and the Patrick Manning government would put a damper on any disbarment proceedings against Wildman in Grenada.