Fri | Mar 29, 2024

Apologise or show the evidence, lawyers tell Chang

Published:Saturday | December 14, 2019 | 12:08 AM
Emile Leiba
Emile Leiba

The Jamaican Bar Association (JAMBAR) has demanded that Minister of National Security Dr Horace Chang retract his assertion that robberies have spiked islandwide as gangsters seek to source funds to pay legal fees for their cronies in jail.

In a letter to Chang, JAMBAR President Emile Leiba expressed concern about “the obvious imputation” that attorneys were either benefiting from or the proximate “cause of the increase in robberies”.

Leiba described the minister’s statement as unfortunate, arguing that it cast the entire legal profession in a negative light. He urged Chang to come forward with evidence to support his claim.

“The honourable minister’s statement will cause the public to harbour suspicions about the lawyers for accused persons and will threaten accused persons’ right to legal representation,” Leiba warned.

“We call on the Hon Minister to either retract his statement and offer an apology or provide further and better particulars of the basis for his reported assertion,” he added.

In the recent trial of Tesha Miller, a witness had testified that gang members paid the legal fees of accused henchmen.

Miller was last week found guilty of accessory before and after the 2008 murder of then chairman of the Jamaica Urban Transit Company, Douglas Chambers.