Lawyers join Sykes in objection to ‘violence producers’ tag
Published:Tuesday | January 10, 2023 | 1:21 AMChristopher Thomas/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
THE CORNWALL Bar Association (CBA) is throwing its support behind statements recently issued by Chief Justice Bryan Sykes questioning the increasing use of the term ‘violence producers’ in reference to persons who are accused by the police of involvement in violent criminal activities.
CBA President Michael Hemmings told The Gleaner on Monday that he and his fellow lawyers object to the term and are calling for a discontinuation of its use.
“I agree with the comments made by the chief justice, as the law makes provisions for the appropriate labels to be given to the accused individuals. For example, there is ‘person of interest’, where the person is wanted by the police for questioning; ‘suspect’, where the person is suspected of committing an offence; ‘accused man’, where the person is charged for an offence; and ‘convict’, where the person has been convicted of a crime,” said Hemmings.
“I would not say its use is an entrenched practice, but it is certainly a phrase that I have objected to my clients being called, and other defence attorneys likewise object. This is more so a warning to those who use said phrase that they should refrain from doing so,” Hemmings added.
On Friday, January 6, in speaking out against the use of the term, Sykes stressed that it is the court of law which should determine whether a person has committed a crime.
“It is the criminal law that determines whether a crime has been committed, and it is a court which determines whether a person should be branded a criminal at the end of the trial process, and assuming that there is a conviction. We have a number of terms being used now, such as ‘violence producers’, but we don’t know who those are,” Sykes argued.
“Is it defined? How do we get to these expressions? The expectations seem to be that once a particular arm of the executive defines them as such, then that is supposed to be accepted without question by the judiciary, [but] just to say that has never been so, and can’t be so,” he argued.
Police Commissioner Major General Antony Anderson said during a press briefing on December 6, 2022, that more than 300 persons described as violence producers were on the Jamaica Constabulary Force’s radar.
Members of the Government have also embraced and have been using the term for some time.
Commenting further on Sykes’ stance, Hemmings said that nowhere in the law is there any provision to call an accused person a violence producer.
“It has been a term coined by the police and used by the police over the years, and oftentimes it is relied on as a basis to object to bail and to detain a person under states of emergency,” said Hemmings.