Samuels-Brown
A MULTI-PRONGED approach to remedying the ailments of the justice system appears to be moving at snail's pace.
A raft of proposals from recommendations of the 28-member Jamaican Justice Reform Task Force have been introduced and others are close to the point of implementation, but there are little signs of improvement within the halls of justice.
President of the Jamaican Bar Association, Jacqueline Samuels-Brown, told The Gleaner that some of the measures implemented by the administration to speed up the trial process have had very little effect to date.
Samuels-Brown described the backlog as alarming, arguing that the build-up in the system was an indication of frequent adjournments of cases, people spending years in custody awaiting trial and the inefficient and "wasteful use of time" by stakeholders including lawyers.
"It is indicative ... that people are not getting what the Constitution supposedly guarantees them - a fair trial within a reasonable time," she says.
Early days
However, the prominent lawyer acknowledged that it was still early days to make a full assessment of the new measures designed to increase efficiency in the justice system.
Plans to boost the complement of judges in the Supreme Court from 26 to 40 and to increase judges of the Court of Appeal from seven to 13 have not yet materialised.
An assessment done by the ministry last year showed that there were 19,456 active cases in the RM courts as at July 2007. Attempts to get an update on the current excess of cases were unsuccessful as a liaison at the ministry said the figures were being tallied and would not be available by the time of publication.
Moves by the ministry to dent the severe backlog come with an expensive price tag. Lightbourne's State of the Nation address indicated that it would cost the country $103 million annually to cut the backlog. At the same time, the Government allocated little less than $800 million this financial year to the ministry compared with $766.5 million in the 2008/2009 fiscal year. This represents a 23 per cent increase in nominal terms or $33.4 million.
In April, Prime Minister Bruce Golding signed an agreement with his Canadian counterpart Stephen Harper to fund the ongoing reform of Jamaica's justice system to the tune of $18 million.
Specific areas to be financed under the project are the strengthening of justice institutions, promoting legislative and policy reforms and encouraging communities to provide input into justice system reform.
RM courts - 19,456 active cases as at July 2007.
40 per cent or 7,831 of these cases exceeded the eight-month time frame in jurisdictions like the US.
77 per cent of the cases were crime-related
18 per cent civil cases
5 per cent coroner's matters