Court of Appeal to hear matter in April

The extradition case involving former senior executive Alex Tasker will continue on April 14.

That’s when oral submissions will be heard by a panel of Court of Appeal judges including Chief Justice Sir Patterson Cheltenham.

The adjournment was granted when the extradition appeal came up before Sir Patterson and Justices of Appeal Francis Belle and Margaret Reifer on Thursday.

In September last year Chief Magistrate Ian Weekes ruled that Tasker – the former Insurance Corporation of Barbados Ltd. (ICBL) executive linked to the Donville Inniss cash-for-coverage scandal – be turned over to United States authorities to stand trial.

Weekes ruled “The entire series of transactions as submitted before me in the bundle and the other information satisfies this court that Mr Alex Tasker should be committed for surrender to United States authorities.”

But the extradition was stayed for 15 days from the day of the ruling, with Tasker remaining on bail, while his lawyers appealed the District ‘A’ Magistrates’ Court decision.

US federal authorities want the businessman to be tried for his alleged role in a money laundering scheme that led to the conviction in the US of ex-minister Inniss for pocketing bribes in exchange for awarding government insurance contracts to ICBL.

Prosecutors allege that between August 2015 and April 2016 Tasker conspired with others to launder money in the US from outside the country in violation of US law.

During today’s virtual sitting of the Court of appeal it was revealed that Tasker’s attorneys Andrew Pilgrim Q.C., Neville Reid and Lani Daisley had filed two modes of appeal: one under the Magistrates’ Court Act and a notice of an application for leave to appeal.

When questioned by the Chief Justice on the filings, Pilgrim said, “Not being familiar with any learning that said it was inappropriate to come under the Magistrates’ Court Act, I thought it prudent to file both rather than be caught out as having not filed one or the other. So I filed both.”

Conferring with the other justices, Sir Patterson said that the court would need submissions on “whether there is merit on the two-prong appeal taken by the appellants [and] whether each one is viable”.

The Chief Justice ordered that Pilgrim and his team file and serve written submissions on or before March 4 on whether the appeal procedure under the Magistrates’ Court Act is applicable in the extradition matter or whether the appeal is governed by the Extradition Act Cap 189.

Counsel for the respondents – the Commissioner of Police – Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions Alliston Seale and Senior Crown Counsel Oliver Thomas are to file written submissions in reply on or before March 29. The matter will then be heard 16 days later by the panel.
fernellawedderburn@barbadostoday.bb