By FRANCIS JOSEPH
A man who was left to rot at the Golden Grove State Prison for eight years, is to receive a million-dollar payout.
The Court of Appeal, comprising Justices Prakash Moosai, Gillian Lucky, and Eleanor Donaldson-Honeywell, awarded the damages to Wendell Beckles in a judgment dated October 30.
The evidence before the court was startling. It was a case of a man left in prison despite his pleas for freedom.
THE EVIDENCE
Beckles was arrested and charged with the offence of arson in 1999. He was committed to stand trial and remained incarcerated awaiting trial. In 2001, his matter was referred back to the Magistrates Court by the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) for the taking of further evidence.
On the 18th of December 2001, he was discharged by the Magistrate. For reasons which defy explanation, Beckles was never released, but in fact remained imprisoned without any lawful justification from the 18th of December 2001 until the 8th of September 2009. He attained his freedom after the filing of a writ of habeas corpus.
Beckles filed a claim for false imprisonment. The Attorney General did not enter a defence and default judgment was entered.
Beckles gave evidence that he was scared, frustrated and confused. In his own words, he began to suffer from depression, and started to believe that he would never get out of jail and that he would die there.
He believed that he had been abandoned by everyone, a thought that was undoubtedly exacerbated by the fact that his parents never visited him throughout his detention. This evidence was not only uncontested, but wholly accepted by the Master.
But the State came with a novel point. It claimed that Beckles filed his claim outside the statute of limitations.
As disclosed in the reasons of the trial judge, because of indications given at early procedural hearings, the State was allowed to rely on the statute of limitations on the assessment of damages. As a result, Beckles was limited to recovering damages for only four of the eight years that he was falsely imprisoned. For reasons which have no bearing on the appeal, the Court of Appeal ordered that the assessment of damages be remitted and reheard before a Master.
THE MASTER’S DECISION
Master Patricia Sobion’s assessment exercise commenced with a summary look at the particulars of Beckles’ unlawful imprisonment as set out in his statement of case. The undisputed facts accepted by her were the same as set out in the judgment. She then proceeded to examine in some detail the uncontested evidence as revealed in the Beckles’ witness statement.
After noting Beckles’ understanding that he had been discharged by the Magistrate on the 18th of December 2001, the Master commenced a step by step assessment of his experiences and consequential mental state from the time that he was returned to jail and to his cell, notwithstanding the fact that he had informed the prison officers that he had been released by the Magistrate.
Also considered were the conditions in which he was kept throughout his unlawful incarceration. The Master concluded her examination of Beckles’ evidence by noting his admission to feeling bad when people looked at and spoke about him, and that people did not believe that he could have been imprisoned for so long without being convicted of anything.
On the issue of limitation, Beckles challenged whether the AG, having not filed a defence, could rely on the limitation period to limit its liability for his false imprisonment to a period of four years prior to the filing of his claim. There having been no appeal against the limitation order, it was the Master’s view that that order remained binding upon the parties at the assessment exercise before her and declined to reconsider the limitation issue. She found further support in this view by virtue of the court of appeal’s order remitting the assessment, observing that it did not touch or concern the said limitation order.
In an eight-page judgment, Justice Moosai said, “Having regard to the failure of the Master to fully assess and account for the mental suffering of the appellant as part of her assessment exercise, as well as her failure to consider the additional aggravated feature that the appellant was only able to secure his release through a writ of habeas corpus application, we are of the view that an appropriate award for general damages is the sum of one million dollars. In all other respects, the order of the Master is affirmed.”
The Master had made the following order:
1) The defendant shall pay the claimant general damages assessed in the sum of $800,000 with interest at the rate of 2.5% per annum from September 11, 2009 to April 27, 2018.
2) The defendant shall pay the claimant exemplary damages in the sum of $100,000. 3) The defendant shall pay the claimant costs on the prescribed scale.
In total, Beckles will receive $1.1 million, in damages, interests and costs.
