STEPHEN ‘Die’ Stubbs wants to take his battle against a murder retrial to the London-based Privy Council after Court of Appeal judges yesterday dismissed his appeal.
However, the man charged along with two others in connection with the March 1999 murder of Constable Jimmy Ambrose was not granted a stay on the retrial pending appeal before the country’s highest court.
Jerone Roberts, who represents Stubbs along with Murrio Ducille, made the application for a stay on the proceedings in Supreme Court to allow his client, who had given his attorneys instructions, to appeal to the highest court.
However, the application was opposed by the prosecution and refused by the court because the judges were not minded to further delay the retrial, which they ordered should happen as soon as possible.
That is scheduled for tomorrow, June 5. Stubbs, Andrew Davis and Clint Evans each face a murder charge.
On May 21, Stubbs’ attorneys made a constitutional motion to Justice Roy Jones who is presiding over the case.
Mr Roberts presented authority cases concerning judgements on matters being retried after an “unreasonable” delay and said his client would not have a fair trial due to adverse media reports.
The prosecution’s response to this was to argue that the application had “no merit”. They countered with case authorities.
Justice Jones deferred his decision in the matter until May 27, when he ruled that while there was an excessive delay in the re-hearing of the matter, and notwithstanding adverse media reports, a fair retrial was possible.
He made declarations in order to ensure this.
However, Stubbs and his attorneys appealed the ruling and a substantive hearing was heard yesterday, which lasted nearly four hours before Justices Stanley John, Abdulai Conteh and Neville Adderley.
Mr Roberts argued that the matter had been outstand for a number of years since a retrial was ordered in 2004.
He noted that even if one took into account that the matter came up again in 2008, the matter still did not commence, making the case more than five-years old.
The lawyer presented legal authorities to support the argument that such a period constituted an excessive delay and a breach of his client’s right to trial in a reasonable time.
He also noted that there had been numerous adverse reports in the media since the retrial was ordered.
In response, the Crown submitted that the only time lapse that occurred in the case was when the Court of Appeal made a ruling on a recusal application in September 2009, making the matter nearly four years old.
The prosecution contended that the judge had taken sufficient measures and declarations as far as jury empanelling was concerned, to ensure that a fair trial took place, not withstanding pre-trial publicity.
The judges dismissed the appellant’s appeal after taking a short recess to consider the submissions.
They ruled that they were not satisfied with the appellant’s submissions that a fair trial was not possible and saw no basis to interfere with Justice Jones’ ruling and order concerning Stubbs’ constitutional motion.
Mr Roberts then applied for a stay on the proceedings in the lower court in order to file an appeal to the Privy Council but the application was refused.
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