Westmoreland Circuit Court challenged by low juror numbers – DPP Llewellyn
Published:Friday | July 8, 2022 | 12:05 AMAlbert Ferguson/Gleaner Writers
WESTERN BUREAU:
Paula Llewellyn, the director of public prosecution (DPP), has expressed concern that efforts to settle matters in the nation’s courts are being affected by low juror numbers.
Only 13 jurors reported for duties on June 6 – some three weeks after the commencement of the Westmoreland Circuit Court.
“We had a problem at the beginning of the circuit. We really only had not more than 12 or 13 jurors, but we were able to do two cases,” Llewellyn told reporters while she was in the parish last week.
Six of those jurors returned a guilty verdict to convict a 17-year-old boy for rape, buggery and murder, committed against a nine-year-old schoolgirl in 2018.
“This case took us nearly two weeks and we have a volume of cases of over 200,” the DPP said.
There are 105 new cases among the full list of 298 cases on the court’s mention list. Of that number, 193 have been traversed from other court sittings, where 64 are for murder, 68 are for possession of identity information, which is an offence under the Law Reform – Fraudulent Transactions – Special Provisions Act, widely referred to as the lottery scamming law.
Sexual offence accounts for 42 of the remaining 61 cases on the traversed list, and the other 19 cases have a combination of wounding, assault, and causing death by dangerous driving, and other offences.
She urged Jamaicans to make themselves available to serve as jurors.
“It is a very important duty (jurors) as citizens because you are the standard-bearer of what is appropriate behaviour in your community,” said Llewellyn. “I would appeal and implore all Jamaicans, when you get your jury summons, please come forward.”
She said the trial and conviction of the 17-year-old for rape and murder was the first full-blown jury case since the resumption of jury trials, which had been suspended to mitigate against the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We did one before in respect of an 80-year-old woman who had been burgled and raped. At the end of her evidence the accused threw in the towel and pleaded guilty, so we were not able to go the full length in respect of the jury coming to a verdict,” the DPP explained
She stressed the value of the experience.
“I consider myself an advocate. I love appearing before the jury … especially in cases like this, it is so important that the man and the woman on the streets who are peers of the family of the victim and the family of the accused, it is important that they really have a say in the type of standards of behaviour that would be acceptable in the community here,” Llewellyn said.
Llewellyn shared: “In the majority of situations, Jamaica by and large still has a majority of its citizens who are part of the alliance of the law abiding.”