Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj, SC says he has not received a response from the registrar of the High Court in relation to a reported move by the Judiciary to seal documents filed by former chief magistrate Marcia Ayers-Caesar against the Judicial Legal Service Commission (JLSC) and the President.
As such, Maharaj said it must be presumed therefore that no application was made to a judge for the proceedings to be sealed and no judge had made any order for the proceedings to be sealed.
On Friday, the media reported that the Judiciary had moved to seal all documents involved in the legal action filed by Ayers-Caesar.
Maharaj said, when questioned, he informed the media that no application to seal the proceedings were served on him or his law firm and the procedure required to seal the proceedings required an application to be made to a judge to seal the proceedings but such an application was not served on his law firm or his client.
Maharaj later wrote the registrar of the Supreme Court requesting confirmation of the media reports and a description of the process used to issue the order and requested a response by 4 PM.
This response was not forthcoming.
Ayers-Caesar initiated legal action against the JLSC and the President in July for the decision to strip her of her position as a High Court judge.
She resigned from the Magistracy in April after being appointed to the High Court bench before also being made to step down form that position.
She is seeking to have the court judicially review the move by the JLSC, which she says is illegal.
In a response yesterday, Maharaj said the Civil Proceedings Rules of T&T and the established principles of public law provide that whenever there is a hearing of a Judicial Review application it should be heard in public.
“The proceedings which have been filed by Ayers-Caesar, however, are public law proceedings.
“Public law proceedings are filed against public officials and public bodies for the court in its supervisory jurisdiction to determine whether the public authority acted illegally, in breach of the rules of natural justice or unfairly or acted unreasonably or irrationally,” said Maharaj.
“In these Judicial Review proceedings which have been filed there are allegations by Marcia Ayers-Caesar that provisions of the Constitution in relation to her were contravened.”
He said the inherent jurisdiction of the court could not be used to prevent a public hearing in any matter when there was sufficient public interest for the proceeding to be heard in public.
“There are restrictions in law against the registry providing to non parties to claims filed access to the documents filed in court proceedings.
“It would appear that the wrong term was used to members of the Media in describing these restrictions as the proceedings being sealed.
“By using the term that the proceedings were sealed could have given the impression that there was a court order sealing the proceedings with the consequence that the hearing of the proceedings would be conducted privately.”
He said the courts in T&T administer justice in public at which anyone may attend and the press may report and that the justification for this principle was the value of the public scrutiny as the guarantor of the quality of justice.
“The right to a public hearing is protected by our Constitution and the principles of the common law. The rationale for this rule is that it is a means for public confidence in the courts to be maintained.
“This principle of Open Justice, however, is subject to exceptions such as restrictions against a public hearing in respect to matrimonial matters, ward-ship proceedings, interlocutory proceedings and in cases where statutes have expressly provided for private hearings such as cases involving children, trade secrets and national security in immigration matters.”
He said the proceedings which had been filed by Ayers Caesar were public law proceedings.