It is most unusual and judicially improper for a Court to publish its judgment in the public media before it has been delivered and communicated to the litigants and their legal representatives. This is what the Caribbean Court of Justice did in the Caribbean Court of Justice Civil Appeal Case No. BBCV2014/002 – Systems Sales Limited v. Arlette O. Browne-Oxley and Sonja Patsena Suttle – a procedure that has never occurred in the Supreme Court of Barbados since our independence.
The Judgment which on the face of it reads “The Judgment” of Justices Wit, Hayton and Anderson which was delivered by The Honourable Mr. Justice Hayton on the 25th day of November 2014 was never read nor delivered to the parties or their Attorneys-at-Law on the 25th November 2014. The Attorneys-at-Law for the Applicant received an electronic copy of the Judgment on the 26th November 2014 and the signed hard copy was received by the Applicant from the sub-Registry of the Court (the Barbados Supreme Court Registry) on the 4th December 2014. Strangely enough, a media release number 28-2014 dated the 25th November 2014 was issued by the Court to the media and published on that same day. It is to be noted that the “media release” the electronic copy and the signed hard copy all bear the date 25th November 2014 even though they are not identical documents. What has therefore resulted is that the Court has published three different official judgments on the same case.
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