A Cayman Islands Grand Court justice will continue the legal challenge to his September arrest despite being cleared last week in an on-going criminal investigation.
Cleared of charges, Justice Alexander Henderson intends to pursue damages that may reach more than a million dollars. |
‘While it may seem somewhat academic on the surface, it’s a necessary step in my receiving damages,’ Justice Alexander Henderson said.
Aggravated and exemplary damages in any lawsuit filed on behalf of Mr. Henderson could total more than a million dollars, according to the judge.
Mr. Henderson was arrested on 24 September by officers with a special investigating team from the UK Metropolitan Police force which has been in Cayman since last year looking into alleged misconduct within the police service and the local judiciary. His home and office were searched by officers following that arrest.
A visiting judge later quashed the search warrants investigators used claiming they were improperly and illegally obtained.
Last week attorneys for Justice Henderson filed another request for judicial review, this time for his arrest. They have claimed that arrest was unlawful.
The review request was filed the same day the attorney general’s office discontinued the criminal investigation against Mr. Henderson.
‘Justice Henderson is no longer the subject of the aforementioned or any investigation,’ a letter from Attorney General Samuel Bulgin to lawyers at the Campbell’s law firm read. ‘The entire episode has clearly caused inconvenience and discomfort to your client which is regretted.’
‘I’m not surprised,’ Mr. Henderson said when asked for his reaction to Mr. Bulgin’s letter. ‘(The Met investigation) has always been an abusive and improper proceeding.’
The judge who tossed out the search warrants against Mr. Henderson had already asked for enquiries into damages to be made.
The judicial review application regarding Mr. Henderson’s arrest also seeks damages for ‘false arrest, trespass to the person and unlawful detention.’
If the court agrees that Mr. Henderson’s arrest was unlawful, it could widen the boundaries of any monetary damages awarded in a lawsuit or settlement.
‘I don’t know who would have to pay for it, I would hope it’s not the people of the Cayman Islands,’ Justice Henderson said.
The application for review of the judge’s arrest states that police can only take someone into custody without a warrant if he or she is suspected of an ‘arrestable offence’ as defined by the Cayman Islands Criminal Procedure Code.
UK Met officers sought arrest and search warrants after Mr. Henderson refused to consent to a search of his home. He was taken into custody prior to those warrants being granted.
Misconduct in a public office is not specifically listed as an arrestable offence in the Cayman Islands Criminal Procedure Code.
Contempt of court?
The alleged misconduct of which Mr. Henderson has now been cleared involved accusations that he improperly used his influence in requesting that a local newspaper employee look into certain letters which the judge was concerned might have amounted to contempt of court.
The letters were published in the Cayman Net News in July and August 2007. They were generally critical of the courts system and of Chief Justice Anthony Smellie in particular.
At least one of the letters was printed under the name of a Cayman Brac resident who later denied she had written it.
Mr. Henderson’s lawyer, Ramon Alberga, said in judicial review proceedings last month that the letters could be construed as a type of contempt known as ‘scandalising the court.’
Attorneys for the police argued that Mr. Henderson knew the letters did not amount to contempt before he asked newsman John Evans to find out who penned them.
A formal complaint about the letters was made to the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service in 2007. The police have not commented on whether that complaint was ever investigated.
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