00:00 In January of this year, High Court Master Martha Alexander issued an order for the state to pay $20 million in compensation
00:08 to nine men who were acquitted of the 2006 kidnapping and murder of businesswoman Vindra Naipaul Kulman.
00:16 But High Court Judge Joan Charles has now set this aside, ruling that the proceedings had not been properly served on the Attorney General
00:24 in accordance with the State Liability and Proceedings Act.
00:28 Attorney General Reginald Amor, Senior Counsel, informed the media of this today.
00:32 According to the AG, the reason provided by Justice Charles was that, quote,
00:37 "The claimants have not established that the claim form and statement of case was served.
00:43 Consequently, an important mandatory condition for permission to enter judgment against the defendant,
00:50 pursuant to CPR or Consolidated Civil Proceedings Rules 12.3(a) and 12.4(a) was not met.
00:59 It follows that the judgment was wrongly entered and must be set aside pursuant." End quote.
01:06 Amor said that he is pleased by the ruling of Justice Charles in setting aside the award of damages
01:12 to Siobhan and Devon Peters, their sibling Anthony Gloucester, as well as Ronald Armstrong, Marlon Trimmington,
01:20 Antonio Charles, Joel Frazer, and brothers Kida and Jameel Garcia.
01:26 The men were set free in 2016 and sued the state in 2020.
01:30 The initial $20 million award by Alexander, which came based on a failure of the state to defend itself against the lawsuit
01:38 filed by the acquitted men, sparked contention.
01:42 A.G. Amor held a news conference the day after claiming that the Naipaul-Coolman file had vanished from the office
01:48 of the Solicitor General after being served in June 2020 and had somehow reappeared after the default judgment was made.
01:56 An investigation was launched into the missing file and despite calls to make the findings public, they were not.
02:04 In March 2023, the A.G. signaled the state's intention to challenge the ruling and proceeded to do so.
02:11 Amor calls the ruling by Justice Charles to set aside Alexander's ruling an important victory
02:17 as he thanks his team, Ralston Nelson Senior Counsel, and attorneys at law Ria Mohammed Davidson and Elena Araujo.
02:25 Alicia Boucher, TV6 News.
02:28 [BLANK_AUDIO]
Comments