Tyrone Reid, Enterprise Reporter

Poor accounting practices within the nation's courts, costing the country millions of dollars, will be the main agenda item when the Ministry of Justice goes before Parliament's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Tuesday, May 13. Bookkeeping problems from as far back as 1989 include incomplete and missing accounting records and outstanding bail bonds amounting to millions.

"The ministry will have to tell the nation why the poor accounting practices have continued unabated for so many years and why there is no indication that anything has been done to clean up the system," says newly installed auditor general, Pamela Monroe-Ellis, in a interview with The Sunday Gleaner.

The Auditor General's Department is mandated by the Constitution to audit the financial affairs of state entities.

Stricter adherence to bail act needed

Former auditor general, Adrian Strachan, in his 2006-2007 report, revealed that the system had in excess of 1,000 outstanding warrants for people who dishonoured bail bonds and outstanding commitments, with a cumulative value of approximately $57 million. In the same report, he called for stricter adherence to the requirements of the Bail Act and expressed concern for the impact of this on the justice system.

"Failure to execute the warrants and carry out the order of the court could undermine the effectiveness of the judicial system and allow perpetrators to go unpunished," read a section of the report.

According to the report, "Records at the courts visited, disclosed 1,232 outstanding warrants for violation of bail bonds and 965 outstanding commitments involving approximately $32m and $24.9m respectively for the period April 2005-July 2007."

The report further stated: "It was also observed that warrants were often not issued promptly and in many instances, persons who stood as surety for bail were unknown at the addresses given.

"Additionally, commitment registers were not faithfully maintained and the requirement for unexecuted warrants and unpaid fines to be reported to the courts for corrective action was not always followed."

In the audits done on selected court offices between 2000-2001 and 2006-2007, the auditor general red-flagged the offices of Resident Magistrate's courts, Family and Traffic courts for the same breaches every year save one - the 2003-2004 fiscal year.

More weaknesses

The 2006-2007 report also pointed to "a continuing need for improvements in the level of internal checks; maintenance of cash books, value books, receipt books, blank-cheques registers; and, control over the use of telephones. These weaknesses could result in the loss or misuse of public funds".

When contacted for a comment, Michael Cohen, public relations officer at the justice ministry, says that the ministry was due to face the PAC this week, and that a gag order was in effect.

"The Ministry of Justice will be appearing before the Public Accounts Committee during the week of May 12, and so it would be inappropriate to release any information concerning the auditor general's report prior to the PAC sitting."