The Official Gazette of December 29, 2011 published the list of attorneys-at-law registered with the Supreme Court of Barbados with effect from January 31, 2011. Many practicing attorneys have been omitted from that list. These include certain senior counsel and, indeed, members of the inner bar of both local and international reputation. Among them:
Sir Frederick Smith Q.C., Mr Edmund King Q.C., Mr Maurice King Q.C., Mrs Beverley Walrond Q.C., Mr Hal Gollop, Mr Vernon Smith Q.C.
As a result, all these attorneys-at-law have been defamed by the Registrar, as the failure to include their names on the list implies that they have either been disbarred or that they are deceased. And it looks as if the Registrar is likely to be sued for defamation, as BU has learned that letters giving notice of legal action have been sent to the Registrar.
That none of the people named above are either deceased or have been disbarred and all have their licenses to practice, is likely to see the Registry successfully sued for tens of millions of dollars.
It means that the Registrar by this omission has stated that these and other also-omitted licensed legal practitioners have misrepresented themselves to their clients as being licensed legal practitioners. Also that these licensed legal practitioners have been illegally and fraudulently passing themselves off as attorneys-at-law.
Then too, there are the losses that these attorneys-at-law must seen to have suffered by way of new clients through their names having been omitted from the Registrar’s list and thus defamed and besmirched.
Hell hath no fury like a lawyer defamed.
But what sort of message does this send to overseas investors who rely and have relied upon these leading members of the legal profession? If one examines the list of lawyers from Barbados who, in the last year, have appeared before the Caribbean Court of Justice, one will certainly find the names of Mrs Beverley Walrond Q.C., Mr Vernon Smith Q.C. and Mr Hal Gollop among others who have, according to the Registrar, appeared before the CCJ fraudulently and illegally purporting to be attorneys-at-law.
The Chief Justice’s six month report card will soon be due and this defamation by the Registrar cannot be seen as other than a serious blot on that report card.
As for the Registrar, in any law practice this omission would be seen as grounds for immediate dismissal. Since the Justice System is, in essence, the largest law practice in the country, clearly this egregious conduct on the part of the Registrar constitutes grounds for immediate dismissal – without pension.
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