PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad,– High Court Master, Nalini Singh, Friday granted bail to murder accused Joel King, becoming the first person to benefit from a ruling by the Court of Appeal last month that Section 5(1) of the Bail Act of 1994, which previously precluded judicial officers from considering bail for those accused of murder, was unconstitutional.
“The unanimous view of this panel is that, by removing the jurisdiction of High Court judges to grant bail to persons charged with murder, section 5 has trespassed on a core judicial function,” the Court of Appeal, headed by Chief Justice Ivor Archie, had ruled in February.
King, who had been charged with murdering Nkosi Harricharan in Belmont on the outskirts of the capital on April 15, 2014, was granted TT$1.5 million (One TT dollar=US$0.16 cents) bail with a surety and was given a cash alternative of TT$575,000.
The High Court Master ruled that although the State’s case against King may be potentially strong, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) failed to prove that the accused would abscond if granted bail with strict conditions.
As a result, she imposed 21 conditions to King’s bail, including having him report to a police station twice weekly, reside at his mother’s home, and not leave between 6 pm and 6 am unless it is for an emergency.
The accused was also ordered not to contact or communicate with State witnesses or come within 100 feet of them. He was called to remain in Trinidad and Tobago and that he could not be found on a boat or airplane.
The High Court Master also ordered that he cannot apply for a passport or divers’ license while on bail. Any breach of the 21 conditions, including being charged for another criminal offense, would result in the immediate revocation of his bail.
The Office of the Attorney General was initially denied a suspension of the Court of Appeal’s ruling on the issue but is expected to raise the issue again in an urgent appeal before the United Kingdom-based Privy Council.
Media reports Friday said that there were 44 applications for bail for murder as of last week.
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