Barbara Gayle, Staff Reporter
A MAN who works in the garage behind the Supreme Court who shouted suggestive comments to a female judge on Thursday, found himself in hot waters for a while but he later managed to extricate himself by apologising.
The police released the man after they could find no ground on which to charge him for what the police described as "sexually abusive words".
Reports are that the judge, in wig and gown, was being escorted to court when the man shouted to her, "Judgie, judgie, judgie. Sexy, come here nuh!" The judge was then walking along the balcony of the Supreme Court building on King Street.
Policemen having heard the man shouting to the judge went over to the car park on Temple Lane where the man was, and took him to the court house, placing him in the holding area where prisoners are detained.
Workers from the garage told a lawyer who was on his way to court what had happened to their colleague and the lawyer went to the holding area and asked the police what charge was being laid against the man.
The police had no answer and the lawyer informed Asst. Supt. Ivanhoe Thompson, who is assigned to the Supreme Court, of the situation.
Asst. Supt. Thompson and several other lawyers went to the holding area and reprimanded the man for his behaviour. The man said he had meant no harm and he did not know what possessed him to call out to the judge.
A lawyer commented that if this incident had happened in the United States, the man could be charged with sexual harassment.
A debate then ensued between the police and the lawyers over the likely charges that could be brought against the man, with the lawyers pointing out that there was no law in Jamaica under which the man could be charged for the words that he used. The police agreed and the man was released after he was reprimanded by both the lawyers and the police.
The man admitted that he was wrong and he wrote an apology to the judge in which he said he never meant any disrespect and was truly sorry for what he had done.
"People must learn to be respectful to the judges and to women on a whole," Asst. Supt. Thompson said. He said that what the man did was very disrespectful and rude.
