‘Silent’ attorneys declare decisions on gun crimes must be left to judges

Arguing that the law must be applied with regard to the circumstances of individual cases, attorney Peter Champagnie is urging that the debate around Jamaica’s firearms legislation not be reduced to a political issue.

“It cannot be a Cinderella approach, not one size fits all,” Champagnie said, as members of the legal profession yesterday staged a silent protest at the Supreme Court in downtown Kingston, where they called for changes to the Firearms Act.

The attorneys gathered in the well of the court and stood in silence as they sought to draw attention to concerns surrounding the legislation, particularly the mandatory minimum sentence and its impact on judicial discretion.

“The biggest issue we have is the mandatory minimum which has taken away the discretion of the judge totally and we continue to have the backlogs, cases not moving through the system as they should,” stated Tenneshia Watkins, president of The Jamaican Bar Association (JamBar).

“For that reason, if that is one of the first things that we see change, then we would have made a major impact in this piece of legislation.”

The legal fraternity is calling for the mandatory minimum sentence to be removed and for a review of the legislation.

The attorneys also raised concerns about the treatment of imitation firearms, arguing that possession of such items should not automatically result in the same treatment in every case.

“When we speak about the imitation firearms as well, we can’t lump every matter the same way. One possession is not the same as the other. We can’t treat these matters uniformly,” Watkins argued.

The protest was organised by the Advocates’ Association of Jamaica and JamBar, in collaboration with bar associations across the island.

The lawyers said they had previously written to the relevant authorities and sought to engage the Government through what they considered the appropriate channels, but had not received the response they wanted.

“We have written to the powers that be; we have gone through what we believe are the proper channels and we have not gotten any results nor response,” Watkins disclosed.

“If this is the way we now try to draw the attention to get back at the table, we are open and willing to [engage in] any type of discussion, but the change must come. It’s well overdue.”

The attorneys stressed that their position should not be interpreted as opposition to efforts to reduce violent crime.

“We are not saying we want to be soft on crime. We all want a safe Jamaica to live in,” Watkins said.

However, the attorneys said judicial discretion does not mean judges will necessarily impose lenient sentences.

“We are lawyers and we know what our rights are. We know what justice looks like and what we are seeing now is not justice. We have competent judges on the bench, they know how to do their work, [so] allow them to do it.”

The attorneys also rejected suggestions that the reduction in murders should be attributed solely to the firearms legislation.

“To say that murders are down because of the gun laws, in our view, is absolutely a misfit,” Champagnie said.

At the same time, he commended members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force for their work.

“Yes, crime is down and we are happy for that. But this is more than that.

“Let us not take it as a political campaign, as some are doing,” he said, referring to what he described as misleading anti-protest placards portraying the protesting lawyers as ‘PNP lawyers’ and ‘gunmen lawyers’.

“We have seen it. And it is actually very offensive, and it is misleading.”

The lawyers are calling for a meeting with the authorities and action towards reviewing the legislation. The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions is also in agreement that the mandatory minimum sentence should be removed, adding its voice to calls for a review of the legislation.

tiffany.pryce@gleanerjm.com