THE JUDICIARY has rubbished suggestions of there being "any nefarious intent or conspiracy" by the judge who ruled on the interpretation summons striking down certain portions of law that related to the appointment of an acting commissioner of police because of a correction of an error in her order.
In a statement on Saturday, the Judiciary took issue with the suggestion that Justice Nadia Kangaloo had amended her order after she gave her ruling in the Ravi Balgobin-Maharaj interpretation claim on Thursday.
On Friday, Opposition Leader alleged political interference after attorneys for the State and the Police Service Commission (PSC) e-mailed the judge's judicial support officer seeking clarification on her order since an early e-mailed copy suggested that the whole of Legal Notice 183 of 2021 - which shortened the process for the appointment of a commissioner and deputy commissioners and also allowed for contract and former contract officers to be considered to act - had been struck out.
Later Thursday night, an amended order was e-mailed to the parties correcting the error to reflect the judge's ruling that only struck out paragraph 4 of the 2021 Order as being superfluous.
Paragraph 4 allowed the commission to submit to the President a list of suitable candidates from among the ranks, including anyone on contract or who was previously employed on contract, to be nominated to act as commissioner and/or deputy, pending the appointment of a substantive office-holder.
On Friday, Newsday was told after the court's (first) order was received at 4.30 pm Thursday, an hour later, one of the attorneys for the State wrote to the judge's JSO and copied members of the team as well as the instructing attorneys for both the PSC, Gary Griffith and the claimant, Balgobin-Maharaj.
The Opposition Leader claimed there was no communication with the claimant.
On Friday, Newsday was shown the series of e-mails to the judge's JSO, including one at 6.09 pm, when the PSC’s attorneys also e-mailed seeking clarification. They also copied the claimant’s attorneys and the other parties. At 8 pm, the corrected order was sent to the parties by the judge’s team.
She had no direct contact with the attorneys, Newsday was told.
Her written decision sent at 11.13 pm – again by her JSO and not her directly.
“I would not think that any judge would contact any party privately."
The Judiciary on Saturday also set out the timeline relating to the correction of the order.
It said it saw as "most unfortunate, and hopefully not born of malicious or Machiavellian intent" the suggestion that the judge amended her order after she gave her ruling.
It expressed hope it was simply a lack of understanding of the process.
It explained that after the judge ruled, the order was quickly drafted and sent out to the parties but "unfortunately" contained a clerical error. These types of errors, the release said, is normally corrected by use of what is called the "slip rule" (the correction of a clerical error).
The Judiciary said as soon
