NASSAU, BAHAMAS — The prosecution of former MPs under the former administration has led to a corruption of justice, according to Damian Gomez, QC, the attorney of former Cabinet minister Kenred Dorsett.
Speaking to Eyewitness News about the matter as his own client mulls over whether he will sue the government, Gomez said: “I have advised him that he has a good case, whether he has the stomach for it is a different matter.”
Gomez insisted that the matter is peculiar because of the “political interference”.
“In each of the cases where supporters of the PLP were singled out for prosecution, that’s no basis other than people who were sought after by the FNM and paid to come to tell the story which couldn’t be sustained,” Gomez said.
In the lead-up to the 2017 General Election, the Minnis administration campaigned on an anti-corruption platform.
Soon after the FNM government took office, several former Cabinet ministers and senior government officials were hauled before the courts.
Gomez said: “The corruption justice attempted by the Free National Movement leadership in the last five years is something that is so egregious that there ought to be consensus on both political sides that this should never happen again.”
In 2017, Frank Smith was charged with abusing his Public Hospital’s Authority (PHA) chairman position, after Barbara Hanna, the owner of Magic Touch Cleaning, was awarded a $516,000 contract to clean the critical care unit of Princess Margaret Hospital.
Chief Magistrate Joyann Ferguson-Pratt threw out Smith’s corruption case, ruling there was “not a scintilla of evidence to support the fact that there was a meeting between Barbara Hanna and the accused prior to the award of the contract”.
In her ruling on the matter, Ferguson-Pratt decried the “egregious” conduct of minister of Health Dr. Duane Sands and Minister of National Security Marvin Dames for their involvement in the case.
It was revealed that Sands had awarded a second contract of $1.8 million to Hanna and that Dames met with Hanna before she made an official complaint to the police.
Prosecutors filed an appeal against the magistrate’s decision; however, the Court of Appeal unanimously rebuked the application.
The matter was also taken to the Privy Council and rejected.
Gomez insisted that the judge applied the law, and noted that the verdicts show that three levels of the judicial system took a “very strong stand on political interference.’
“The judges can only comment and make decisions based on matters which come before them,” he said.
“In my view, they have responded with the acquittals they have sustained. That is the best a citizen can expect of a judiciary.”
Gomez continued: ”The problem is the behaviour of public officials in the last five years caste a question mark over the prosecution of many other people who may not have had the resources to defend themselves in a system where money determines the quality of representation you have.”
Attorney General Ryan Pinder revealed that the star witness in the bribery case of former Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) Shane Gibson wanted to be paid for his witness testimony.
Asked whether he believes a commission of inquiry would be needed under these circumstances, Gomez said: “In most other countries it would have already have seen that. I think that a lot of our community wants to move on from this and that urge to move on is intolerant of having a commission of inquiry that just increases the pain of those who have gone through this”.
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