‘I want back my job’

Ex-cop's long fight to overturn 2011 dismissal

An ex-cop who is challenging a 2011 decision by the Police High Command not to renew his contract will have to wait on the court to determine if he should be reinstated.

Though the Police Federation has said it is looking into the matter involving one of its former general secretaries, Noel Morgan, Assistant Commissioner of Police Jarvis Taylor, who is in charge of the administrative branch at the commissioner's office, said the matter is already before the court so intervention by his office is out of the question.

"Mr Morgan has filled a case against the commissioner in the Supreme Court, so with the matter before the court we can't touch it," said Taylor.

"We are actually researching the matter in conjunction with the Police Service Commission to find out all the facts surrounding it," added Taylor.

For chairman of the Police Federation, Sergeant Raymond Wilson, this is one of several cases that the entity will be asking Police Commissioner Carl Williams to review.

"The Federation believes that we should seek a review from the Police High Command of many of these cases, and we intend to seek permission for this to be done when we meet with the new commissioner of police," said Wilson.

Morgan was kicked out of the Force three years after he and his son were arrested and charged with reasonable suspicion of breaching the Corruption Prevention Act.

The charge stemmed from a raid Morgan led on an auto body repair shop where a number of car parts and a motor car were seized. While he was before the court, Morgan's contract expired and he was given a one-year contract pending the outcome of the case.

Morgan and son appeared before the St Ann's Bay Resident Magistrate's Court on February 19, 2009, where the judge upheld a no-case submission.

With the case having been dismissed, Morgan reapplied for re-enlistment for a term of five years in August 2009.

"I received no correspondence from the department ... which was, and perhaps still is, the practice today where whenever a member's contract is approved for an abbreviated period, the member is informed prior to the expiration of the current contract. However, if the member's contract is approved for the normal five-year period, the member is not so notified," argued Morgan.

Having not heard anything from the High Command, he assumed that his contract was approved for a five-year term.

But things were far from returning to normal, as according to Morgan he was summoned to a meeting on May 7, 2010 where he was informed that investigations were to be reopened into the corruption case.

On November 26, Morgan was served with a notice advising him to cease performing his duties immediately until issues surrounding his contract were resolved.

The 53-year-old has since been tied up in years of litigation trying to get reinstated.

"I want to go back a mi work! Mi a wait long now! My patience is getting thin now; my house is on the brink of foreclosure because mi nuh get no pay since, and is over four years now mi nuh work," Morgan told The Sunday Gleaner.

"In fact, the institution hand it over to debt collectors already who a call mi fi pay dem and mi can pay dem.

CHILDREN'S EDUCATION AT STAKE

"Mi son drop out a high school because mi couldn't afford to keep him down there. Mi have two daughters who go university, and if it wasn't for their mother mi no know how dem woulda manage, and dem mother is a schoolteacher," charged Morgan.

He said he is also struggling to maintain a steady supply of medication to treat his diabetes and hypertension.

Morgan filed for a judicial review on October 7, 2011, but was given a long waiting period, with the case set for December 10 and 11 of this year in the Supreme Court.

According to Morgan, the corruption case is a smokescreen as much of his problems are related to a call he made to a member of the High Command in December 2009, expressing concern about senior members of the Force dropping a charge of illegal possession of firearm against three men who had discharged their licensed guns in an illegal manner.

"If I didn't make that call, I would have gotten one or two promotions in the Force by now," Morgan argued.

ACP Taylor was not able to speak to that accusation but that Morgan, a former general secretary of the Police Federation, was criminally charged, the case dismissed and he was initially re-enlisted.

"We know that he was then not re-enlisted but all the facts surrounding why he was not re-enlisted I don't have that as yet," said Taylor.

In the meantime, the Police Federation believes he has a strong case.

"We found it quite alarming that within a short space of time (after the case was dismissed) the member was severed from the job, and to the best of our knowledge some of the material cited to him related to the said matter for which he was cleared by the court. According to the directives of the Police Service Regulations, this should not be so," said Wilson.

ryon.jones@gleanerjm.com