This past week in the House of Assembly, a bill was introduced and passed that in my opinion was long overdue and an absolutely necessary correction to an egregious and harmful legislation that was draconian and embarrassing in an advanced society such as The Bahamas. I am referring to the changes recently introduced to the Bail Act. For some background, some years back, the Bail Act was amended and the authority to grant bail was removed from magistrates for many offenses for which they previously had that authority. It was implied at the time that this was done to get tough on crime and prevent criminal elements from being granted bail. While the thought might have been noble, the practice and implementation was, in my opinion, severely flawed and responsible for irreparable harm to both the reputation and in some cases, the livelihood of many innocent Bahamians.
Several high-profile individuals fell victim to this legislation and were seen being paraded before the courts for offenses that certainly did not fall in the category of dangerous criminal offenses, yet they had to use their influence, contacts and resources to get bail applications through the Supreme Court to avoid spending time in prison until they could get bail sorted out. For the wealthy and connected, the process was worrisome, but for the uneducated or poor, this was a sentence of severe trauma and even loss of job, family, reputation and permanent impairment. How we arrived at this point as a society is beyond my understanding.
Several members of my church recalled the negative consequences of this unwise legislation as I listened in horror. I was moved to the point of speaking with attorneys general across several administrations, asking for respite and removal of this scourge.
To give an example – one person explained that for a relatively minor offense, they were remanded to Fox Hill prison in an area where there was no room to sit or sleep and only because the person was older, younger men made room for the individual to sit up against a wall. Fortunately, he had relatives in the judicial system, so he was able to get bail a day later while he left many young men in prison who did not understand the process. He explained how one of these individuals worked at one of the major hotels and subsequently lost his job because he was unable to get bail for several days. The young man was innocent, and his alleged offense was not the scale of a major crime, yet his future was compromised because of unnecessary legislation.
After these incidents, I spoke with several prominent attorneys who provided a litany of complaints about similar incidents they encountered with their clients. It was amazing to me that this scenario could persist in a country like The Bahamas that was on the cusp of First World status with an educated population and high standard of living. This type of scenario brought to mind developing countries with semi dictatorships and secret police rather than a well-established democracy with intelligent and professionally sound legal minds. I could understand if bail could not be granted by a magistrate for armed robbery, rape, murder or attempted murder – but to subject citizens to detainment for non-violent offenses that magistrates routinely granted bail for is unimaginable.
This law and system were regressive and oppressive to the extreme, and thankfully, we have finally come to our senses as a nation and reversed this scourge.
I still do not have all the details on the bill, but to my current understanding, magistrates will be allowed once again to grant bail for offenses that they previously had power to grant bail for. I am sure this will also free up the Supreme Court to focus on what the Supreme Court was designed for, and release an unnecessary burden off of the system.
Jesus spoke of considering the least among us and of making sure that we treated others the way we wanted to be treated – hopefully and thankfully we have done this by reversing this egregious and offensive legislation.
• Pastor Dave Burrows is senior pastor at Bahamas Faith Ministries International. Feel free to email comments, whether you agree or disagree, to pastordaveburrows@hotmail.com. I appreciate your input and dialogue. We become better when we discuss, examine and exchange.
The post A welcomed correction appeared first on The Nassau Guardian.
source https://thenassauguardian.com/a-welcomed-correction/
No comments:
Post a Comment