The attorneys for Trinidadian firearms dealer Brent Thomas have started the process of taking legal action against the Barbados Police Service for the manner in which he was arrested and handed over to lawmen from his country last October.
“Brent’s attorneys are currently in the active process of engaging with Bajan legal representatives. This is the focus at this particular point in time,” lawyer Jose Young told Barbados TODAY on Wednesday.
Young, who represented Thomas in the early stages of his firearms case, declined to elaborate. However, other reliable sources in Trinidad and Tobago disclosed that the attorneys will be filing a constitutional motion in the courts here.
On Tuesday, in a ministerial statement to Parliament, Attorney General Dale Marshall admitted that local police “fell short of applicable legal norms” by handing over Thomas, who was in Barbados, to police from Trinidad and Tobago without an extradition request.
“To the extent that there may be any legal liability attaching to the actions of the Barbados Police Service officers, I can assure you that the Government of Barbados will abide by the law and fully respect any decisions of the law courts,” he said although rejecting a Trinidad judge’s classification of the police officers’ actions as an “abduction”.
Justice Devindra Rampersad gave that description in his April 25, 2023 ruling in a constitutional review motion filed by Thomas.
The 61-year-old was staying at a hotel here on October 5, 2023, when officers from the Barbados Police Service arrested him. They later took him to the Grantley Adams International Airport where he was met by Trinidad police who escorted him on a plane back to the twin-island republic. He was subsequently charged with illegal possession of weapons, including grenades and rifles.
Justice Rampersad stayed those charges, saying that Thomas’ detention involved serious breaches of his constitutional rights.
Marshall agreed with the judge that Barbados failed to follow the rule of law and due process when it did not comply with the Extradition Act.
“Barbados has an Extradition Act…which applies to a large number of criminal offences, including the firearm and other offences for which the warrants of arrest for Mr Thomas were issued. I can confirm that no request was made for the extradition of Mr Thomas,” he said in his ministerial statement.
“It is evident that the Barbados Police Service sought to assist a sister police service in a matter which appeared to them to be of a grave and important nature, and especially so, given the scourge of firearm violence that is a feature in Barbados and across the Caribbean. It is my view that they rendered that assistance without any mental element of criminality that would be associated with an abduction,” the Attorney General added.
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