ATTORNEYS representing the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP)are demanding that Attorney General Reginald Armour apologise and retract his criticism against the office.
Some 16 attorneys delivered the two page letter to Armour’s secretary on Wednesday afternoon, moments after DPP Roger Gaspard met with Armour for about three hours at the Armour’s Richmond Street, Port of Spain office.
The attorneys detailed how Armour’s critique was unfounded as their supposed sub-par performance stemmed from an issue of staff shortage, something raised with him last year when he met with them and promised to address.
Last Saturday, Armour issued a statement via WhatsApp saying the DPP’s office was under performing. His comment was a direct response to Gaspard's saying his office has 58 attorneys, some with little or no court experience and was hamstrung by "an acute and chronic" staff shortage that affected its ability to prosecute cases in every court in the country.
Armour said: "That is an unsatisfactory explanation for under-performance of the DPP. Other critical arms of the criminal justice system are also operating below capacity, yet far more effectively. We need to critically examine what are the systemic issues that are hampering the performance of the DPP’s office."
The attorneys recalled a meeting with Armour on July 13 last year at the DPP’s office at Winsure Building, Richmond Street, Port of Spain. During that meeting they said the AG was told of the issues affecting the DPP’s office with the understanding that these issues would be duly addressed.
“Following this meeting, there was a press release from the Office of the Attorney General which posited, ‘The Honourable Attorney General reiterated his commitment to the office of the DPP and assured respect would be maintained. He emphasised that discussions such as these were the first of many to come, with the objective of giving further support and enhancing available resources.’
"The recent statements in the public domain appear to contradict this earlier assurance.”
Attorneys: We're overworked
The attorneys said in order to meet the demands of the job with limited human resources, they regularly worked long hours even on weekends and public holidays.
“This has severely impacted not only our personal and family lives, but also our mental and emotional health.
"Many staff members have also fallen physically ill as a result of the extreme stress under which we operate on a daily basis. As such, we vehemently reject the notion that the Office of the DPP is underperforming.
"We call upon you to issue a public apology to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions and retraction of these unfounded claims.”
They detailed that the workload had increased owing to more murder cases and the introduction of case management conferences and bail hearings for murder accused.
They said attorneys were forced to divide their time and efforts between trials courts, bail courts and Masters courts.
Additionally, with increased High
