(Trinidad Guardian) The details of a national prosecutions structure which entails tracing court data so as to ensure a smoother and better coordinated criminal justice system is expected to be made public next month.
“We are taking the backlog and prepare them for trial and then we are going to establish a single unit to actually manage this. This is very similar to what the British calls a Crown Prosecution. “You have to have national prosecutions in T&T coordinated so the police, the DPP and the judiciary need to have management for all the prosecutions that are done but until you realise where the bulk is then you can’t pour the resources,” Al-Rawi said.
Saying the management of State prosecutions has been in a state of “non-functionality” due to lack of structure and resources for far too long, Al-Rawi said data would show where the prosecutorial focus needed to be placed.
“The exercise is ongoing and would be completed in stages beginning in January and involves mapping what the backlog and prosecution look like in the magistrates’ court, High Court, Police Service and the DPP’s office.
“The figures from the judiciary are nearly complete, the figures from the DPP are now crystallised and the figures from the Police Service are now being formalised,” the AG said adding that there has not been effective coordination on this.
Some 34 vacancies, across the board, were expected to be filled by the DPP’s office starting from next month.
Al-Rawi said ninety five per cent of prosecutions at the magistrates’ court were conducted by the police while DPP officers did five per cent.
“Who manages that? How is that organised? This is a huge question and that is why we have to track the load so that management from a national prosecutions structure can be done.
“I am working on the creation of a national prosecutions structure because unless you manage the 95 per cent that the police does then the system goes no where, “ the AG said.
Saying that the “measurables” were unknown Al-Rawi said data would be made public in the first quarter of next year.
“Right now we’re talking about crime but there is no raw data. Does anybody in this country know how many reports are received at a station on a monthly basis? How many of them move towards the magistrates’ court or the High Court?
“In other words what are the reports versus charge versus conviction figures really look like?
Nobody knows what that figure really looks like and that figure is going to be made public very shortly through the revelation of statistics in the criminal justice system at the magistrate court, High Court and very importantly through statistics from the Police Service,” Al-Rawi said.
In outlining some of the factors revealed by the data collated thus far the AG said it has revealed that delays in the criminal justice system have been caused by trial by jury, preliminary inquiry (PI), lack of resources at the DPP’s office , availability of courtroom, witnesses and judges.
Civil laws to deal with evidence was also another factor.
He said there must be a performance indicator to determine how efficiently the Police Service was using its monies from Government, adding that a lot of the frustration pervading T&T was a sense of hopelessness felt by citizens.
“People say, ‘I will not report this because this will not be dealt with.’ So let’s figure out what it really is,” Al-Rawi added.
He added that legislation to completely abolish preliminary inquiries was already prepared and work was taking place on a public defender system.
“So once your counsel is unavailable you will be appointed a counsel who is competent but that has to be an amendment to reorganisation of the Legal Aid and Advisory Authority. We are working with the British Government and the public defenders office out of England on that particular approach,” Al-Rawi added.
He said he had already drafted a document regarding “judge only trials by election” which was expected to be made public next year and which the AG also described as a “very contentious issue.”
“Meaning you will have the choice of judge only or not which is a jury less position because there is such stout resistance to that position but in our view it is something which is beneficial to the country and therefore we need to come forward with data on it,” Al-Rawi said.
In the first quarter of next year video conferencing is expected to come on stream at remand as opposed to transporting prisoners back and forth every 28 or 17 days as the case maybe, he added.
