Barbara Gayle, Staff Reporter
THE COURT of Appeal yesterday refused to grant an order remitting to the Supreme Court a constitutional point which Trevor Forbes , 57, businessman of Wickie Wackie, Bull Bay, St. Thomas, had filed challenging the Extradition Act.
Forbes' appeal against his extradition order was set for hearing this week, but last week he filed a motion in the Supreme Court contending that the Extradition Act was unconstitutional because it was not passed by special legislation.
Attorneys-at-law Frank Phipps, Q.C., and George Soutar are representing Forbes, who is wanted in the United States to face drug charges
SEEKING STAY
They are seeking the stay because if Forbes lost in the local courts he could take the constitutional point to the United Kingdom Privy Council. The lawyers said if the constitutional point was heard during the hearing of the appeal and the court ruled against him, then that would be the end of his legal battle.
They said if Forbes was successful in the Constitutional Court then he could get damages, while that would not be available in the Court of Appeal. The lawyers pointed out that under the Extradition Act, a person who is to be extradited cannot appeal to the United Kingdom Privy Council in habeas corpusproceedings, seeking his release from custody.
On July 24, 2003 Senior Resident Magistrate Martin Gayle ordered that Forbes should be extradited.
Government lawyers Georgiana Fraser, Annaliesa Lindsay and Carlene Larmond opposed the application on the grounds that it was an abuse of the process of the court. The lawyers said the appeal had been pending for more than a year and it was just last week that the motion was filed in the Supreme Court.
APPEAL TO PROCEED
The Court of Appeal comprising its president Justice Ian Forte, Justice Algernon Smith and Justice Karl Harrison ruled that the appeal should proceed. The court said it would hear the constitutional point raised in Forbes' appeal because it had the power to do so.
Mr. Phipps began making legal submissions yesterday and will continue his submissions today.
This is the first time that the Extradition Act of 1991 is being challenged on the grounds that it was in breach of the Constitution because it was not passed by special legislation.
Forbes is wanted in the United States to face charges of conspiracy to import 1,000 kilograms of marijuana and conspiracy to distribute marijuana and two counts of importing marijuana allegedly committed while he was living in the U.S.
