Christian peace activists pray during a memorial service for cricket coach Bob Woolmer in Islamabad, Pakistan, on April 2. A coroner's inquest has been ordered into Woolmer's death. Woolmer died at hospital in Jamaica after he was found unconscious in his hotel room. - Reuters

For a number of years now, Jamaicans For Justice (JFJ) has been highlighting problems that have come to our attention in the dispensation of justice by the justice system. JFJ has been working in the courts and with complainants for seven years and has amassed a wealth of data on the details (within which lies the Devil) of why cases take five, six, seven or even 10 years to make their way through the courts. We hope the new review and reform of the justice system processes, for whicha project has been commissioned and a contract awarded, will result in substantial and effective change which will allow the timely delivery of justice for all.

With this review now under way, it seems timely to highlight a number of problems which have come to our attention, and which we have brought to the attention of the appropriate authorities over the years, in the hope that action will finally be taken to correct them.

Our focus in this article is problems in the Coroner's Court, for the difficulties there appear particularly intractable and remain uncorrected, and yet solutions appear simple and cost effective.

Service of summons on jurors and witness

Service of summons on jurors and witnesses is done by the Detention and Courts Division of the police force housed at Kingston Mall, 12 Ocean Boulevard, Kingston. This department does service of documents for ALL the courts in the Corporate Area and St. Catherine and, if needed, across the island.

For the task of serving summonses on every juror needed, every witness required for every court case of the Resident Magistrate's, Circuit and Supreme Court cases in Kingston, St. Andrew and St. Catherine, this division has the princely total of 30 officers attached, broken into five or six teams. When asked if this number is adequate to handle the volume of work, the division refuses to answer, suggesting instead that enquiries be directed to the commissioner of police.

JFJ has documented since 1999 that some jurors in the Coroner's Courts serve continuously; they make their living as professional jurors, and serve as jurors on almost every single case that is heard in the Coroner's Court for Kingston and St. Andrew. We brought this to the attention of both the minister of justice and the coroner from as early as 2001. In 2006, the same jurors continued to serve. Attempts to change the system are stymied by problems which we will discuss in greater detail.

The effect of having persons making their living as jurors is that these persons are very reluctant to bring in verdicts which go contrary to the interests or wishes of the authorities (perceived or real), which challenge the status quo, or which might be seen as against the wishes of the police. This is so because if they are seen as 'unreliable' jurors they run the substantial risk of losing their 'work', of not being summoned to be jurors by the police.

Problems of Changing the Status Quo

Persons are supposed to be randomly selected to be served summonses to jury duty from the jurors' list, with certain persons excluded from serving as jurors on the basis of their profession, including medical practitioners, and ministers of religion, among others. This becomes more difficult when the voters' list currently being used to choose jurors and issue summonses is the 2002 list, as is the case in the Coroner's Court of Kingston and St. Andrew. As a result, most of the jurors who are sought to be served have 'removed', have migrated, or are not known at the address on the summons. The court staff is not sure when the new list will be made available to the courts.

Another problem that we have documented is that from time to time in matters before the Coroner's Court in Kingston and Saint Andrew (KSA), there have been NO RETURNS AT ALL for summonses issued for jurors or witnesses, and so matters have had to be adjourned as a result of non-service by the Detention and Courts Division of the police force. The failure to submit returns promptly by the Detention and Courts Division of the police force also results in the court being unable to ascertain prior to the actual court date whether in fact the jurors/witnesses have been served, which would make the court able to determine whether new summonses are to be sent out well in advance of the date for court.

The effect of this is that the court is unable to function at all for that day. This results in the waste of the time and resources of the coroner, the clerk of the courts, the jurors who do show up, the court staff, the family members who take time off to come, and any attorneys present. Jamaica cannot afford this waste of precious resources at this time, nor can we afford the distrust in the justice system that this causes.

Apart from this failure to serve the summonses or to notify the court of problems with the service, there have also been occasions where a return might indicate that the witness no longer resides at the address at which the summons was to have been served. Yet when independent checks are made, they reveal that the witness still resides at the address on the witness statement, which calls into question whether the police personnel actually visit the addresses given or simply report that they have. This completely frustrates the process of the court and the wider function of the judicial system which is the 'timely delivery of quality justice for all'.

The problem with jurors and the service of jury summonses is not limited to matters in the Kingston and St. Andrew Coroner's Court. Matters have also had to be adjourned in several parishes out of KSA due to lack of adequate jurors. Yet, because of the fact that the Detention and Courts Division of the police force does not report to or answer to the coroner, when these breaches occur, the coroners across the island are powerless to do anything, to enforce accountability or to discipline for failure to serve the court.

Solutions

The problems of getting the witnesses and jurors to court could be addressed quite simply and cheaply - if there was sufficient will to do so by those in authority - as follows:

1. Ask the Electoral Office of Jamaica to provide an updated copy of the voters' list to each courthouse in Jamaica. We are convinced they would be willing to oblige.

2. The Coroner's Act, Section 1 (1) limits the number of jurors who may be served at any time in a matter to 30. If this number were to be increased (a simple amendment to the act would be needed) then it would increase the possibility of having enough jurors, [a mere five being the minimum required to start a matter] to serve. Mr. Minister of Justice, we await your action.

3. Also under the Coroner's Act the coroner may appoint a special bailiff in the event that the person entrusted to serve the summons fails to do so within 14 days after the issue of the summons. This special bailiff is selected from a panel of persons selected by the coroner but he or she has to be appointed by the chief justice (section 22A (8) (9) (10)).

It, therefore, seems to Jamaicans For Justice that if the coroner were to select a special bailiff and the chief justice were to appoint him, that almost immediately the coroner would have more accountability for the service of summonses and be in a position to manage more effectively matters in his court and stop the constant wasting of time and resources that is a daily event in the court. It would surely be more cost-effective to appoint this special bailiff than to waste the court's time with non-served summonses for jurors and witnesses.

We hope that the coroners across the island, and the chief justice who has the power to appoint special bailiffs, will act expeditiously to correct the invidious and long-standing problems outlined in having summonses served for jurors and witnesses in the Coroner's Courts.

The article was supplied by Jamaicans For Justice.