Early adjournment in SOE detention case

The court hearing into the prolonged detention of five men under the states of emergency (SOE) was today adjourned early to allow the attorneys to prepare their written submissions for court tomorrow. 

The matter is to resume on Wednesday at 10 a.m. 

Last week, Justice Bertram Morrison ordered that Everton Douglas, Nicholas Heat, Courtney Hall, Courtney Thompson and Gavin Noble be brought before the court to hear submissions on the circumstances under which they were being detained without charge.

Some of them have been in custody for more than a year.

The men are being held under SOEs in Kingston Eastern, St Andrew South, Westmoreland, and Clarendon.

Earlier before the adjournment, Deputy Superintendent Jervis Williams of the St Andrew South Police Division argued that no matter the length of the detentions, once the SOEs are extended by both Houses of Parliament, the men can legally be kept in custody. 

Williams then cited the SOE detention order signed by the minister of national security. 

Jamaicans for Justice senior legal adviser, John Clarke, asked Williams whether the detainees could be kept 20 or 100 years if the security measures were to be extended for those periods.

Williams agreed.

On Monday, Superintendent Victor Hamilton, who is attached to the Westmoreland Police Division, admitted to detaining individuals under the SOEs until enough evidence was gathered to lay charges.

Morrison questioned the value of detentions if persons held in custody would eventually be released back into communities and resume a life of crime.

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