INTERNAL FIGHT OF BELIZE JUSTICE SYSTEM

Justice Conteh of Supreme Court in Belize
Photo is Hon. Wilfred Elrington, Attorney General of Belize.



BELIZE JUSTICE SYSTEM INTERNAL FIGHT ( Two bantam roosters fight.) Elrington won!

MINISTER OF JUSTICE of BELIZE and ATTORNEY GENERAL, HAVE A BATTLE OF WORDS WITH SUPREME COURT JUSTICE CONTEH IN LEGAL SEMINAR

The Supreme Court Justice, Conteh acting as spokesman for a room full of lawyers and connected government people in the legal system of Belize , gave a scathing report of the state of the legal system in Belize , against the UDP Government of Belize. The crux of the message he gave, was the legal system wants a lot more money to function properly from government revenues.

Minister of Justice, and Attorney General, Elrington came back in the packed meeting, with a flat announcement that there is no more money and that the problems lie not with the amounts of money, but the laxity of the Justices to deal promptly with judgements for court cases. Some of which take years. Attorney General Elrington went on to say that the Justices made more salary than he did as a Cabinet Minister, that they have brand new courtesy vehicles, fuel allowances, travel allowances and a whole host of PERKS. His summation was that the Justices were not delivering their jobs in a timely and expert manner. That in fact, they were a privileged lot in the government system, basically spoiled and not performing to the level they are paid. Attorney General Elrington, himself a Belize lawyer, said the government had been sending him around the British speaking Caribbean and to other countries of the Commonwealth, searching to fill government positions in the Justice system, but that the quality of candidate applications was very low and unsatisfactory.

The spokesperson for the legal system seminar, Justice Conteh for the group of Belize lawyers replied to Elrington, they had made a decision to render all judgements for courtcases not later than 90 days. Conteh was wishy washy though and hedged and hawed around that timeline with more excuses for their incompetent performance. However, Conteh went on to make a bunch of excuses and among which; was the failure of the Director of Prosecutions and the police to provide sufficient evidence for many of the court cases. He also mentioned the practice of witness intimidation, and fact, that murderers were being let free by the justices, because witnesses are afraid to give evidence. He said, something had to be done.

The public watched the proceedings on television and street talk later, gave way to suggesting a separate vigilante system for eliminating career thieves and murderers as a solution. Something similar done in rural Guatemalan communities. A sort of Los Pepes as in Colombia , but created in Belize , a secret society of vigilantes.

Belize belongs to a world wide English speaking Commonwealth legal system, fairly standard in many countries around the world and legal people often are hired to work in other countries with similar systems. In Belize we have quite a few legal lawyers that came to Belize to work in the Justice system from other countries.