AG on prisoners’ complaints about

Attorney General John Jeremie yesterday defended the detention of 10 prisoners at Teteron Barracks and Staubles Bay in Chaguaramas.

Jeremie said to ensure the Government was in good standing after complaints by the inmates about the inhumane conditions at the military base, he visited them there last week. However, during the visit, he told the prisoners the authorities are dealing with a crisis and “their rights are secondary to ours,” noting they were also not being kept in premises equivalent to the Hyatt hotel.

Jeremie spoke about his visit during yesterday’s debate on a motion on the Prisons (no 2) Order 2025. This reinforced Teteron Barracks and Staubles Bay as a prison site for the inmates, who were transferred there in the early hours of July 18, when the State of Emergency (SoE) was declared.

The premises at Teteron Barracks and Staubles Bay—which were approved by Homeland Security Minister Roger Alexander—are both district prisons and detention centres. Yesterday’s motion was to redesignate both as prisons as opposed to district prisons, retroactive to July 18.

In response to a specific call from People’s National Movement Senator Faris Al-Rawi for greater specificity on the description of the premises, Jeremie said he was prepared to stand behind the security forces’ advice on the matter.

“They asked to designate premises in a particular way. It’s been designated as such. These individuals are secure in those premises. The premises are not the Hyatt but they’re secure there,” the AG said.

Jeremie said on July 18, certain prisoners who were on remand and who were not yet convicted were transferred to the Chaguaramas facilities. He said Section 5 (2) of the Prisons Act provided that any persons sentenced on summary conviction to imprisonment (with/without hard labour) may be imprisoned at the nearest district prison. He said the incarceration of remandees there was challenged in light of Section 5 (2). But he said Section 7 of the Prisons Act allowed the Commissioner of Prisons power to transfer prisoners from any prison at his discretion.

Notwithstanding this, Jeremie said in order to deter unnecessary legal challenges based on the status of people detained at Teteron/Staubles Bay and out of an abundance of caution, Government proposed that the initial Prisons Order 2025 be revoked and those premises be redesignated as prisons.

Addressing Independent Senator Anthony Vieira’s view that balance must be struck where individual rights and that of the 10 men were concerned, Jeremie said if it were accepted there was an imminent threat on July 17/18, the job of any policymaker in balancing this was to avoid precisely the occurrence that Vieira noted happened 35 years ago—the 1990 coup attempt.

Jeremie added, “It was in that context in the (Lower House) I spoke of the fact that we might not have been here today. Given everything that’s different today—the capabilities of these groups—believe you me, what you’re looking at outside of the prison in terms of number is greater than what we faced in 1990.”

He added, “We’re committed as a Government to the rule of law, to attempting to strike that balance between the rights of the individual and the rights of the many in society.

“It was that fact that drove me to pay a visit to the detainees in Teteron last week before Cabinet and I spoke to them, I went into their cells.

“I’m not fielding requests for meals and better this and so on and so forth. I saw the premises and I’m not a prison expert, but I thought it was my responsibility to see that they were alive, that they were being treated appropriately, given the nature of the threat that we faced,” Jeremie said.

“Now, of course, everybody is complaining—there are complaints about all manner of things. But these are persons who—to be frank—our intelligence services tell us, were plotting, they were an existential threat to the State days ago. So, you should understand while I listened to them, when I looked at them I did so with a jaundiced eye,” the AG added.

“We’re attempting to balance. Sometimes the balance is equally struck, sometimes you weigh one in favour of the other and at this point in time—I’m sorry to say—the balance has to be weighed in favour of the rights of the many.”

He noted that he wore no mask during his visit.

“Everyone else was doing that. I say it to this Senate and I said it to them that we’re dealing with a crisis and their rights are secondary to ours … There will come a time and that day may be soon when I’m very concerned about their constitutional and human rights—Not so today.”

He thanked many, including in the prison service.

“There are individuals in the prison service who are good, hard-working people despite coming under serious threat … when I went to Teteron, all of them were present.”

On the question of the constitutionality of various provisions in the Prisons Act, Jeremie said, “I like my chances. It’s a 1,900-piece of legislation, a lot in it is covered by what we now know to be a very powerful savings of existing laws’ clauses. So I like my chances.”