Governor signs rollover suspension
Cayman Islands Governor Duncan Taylor signed changes to the territory’s Immigration Law suspending the current seven-year term limit on foreign workers’ residence for those who qualify for exemptions from the term limit policy.
The exemption period may only last a total two years if the foreign worker’s employer successfully applies for a Term Limit Exemption Permit. The bill’s fate had been cast in some doubt following a Constitutional challenge over its passage, but Governor Taylor indicated the proposal passed by the Legislative Assembly in September is legal.
Typically, foreign-born employees who reside in the Cayman Islands are required to leave after seven years of continuous residence here unless they are granted what’s known as key employee status, allowing them to remain up to nine years. During that added time the foreign worker may apply for permanent residence – the right to remain in the Cayman Islands for the rest of their lives.
The Constitutional issue raised by North Side MLA Ezzard Miller involved two amendment bills passed in the Legislative Assembly that were not published at least 21 days before the start of the LA meeting in which they were introduced.
Attorney appeals murder conviction
An attorney plans to appeal Larry Ricketts’ conviction for the October 2008 murder of Estella Scott Roberts.
Nicola Moore said she has briefed counsel in London regarding a request to the Privy Council for leave to appeal Ricketts’ conviction. If that fails, she said she will seek a review of his sentence of life imprisonment at the governor’s discretion to the European Court of Human Rights in the Hague.
Ms Moore, of Priestleys Attorneys at Law, said the mandatory sentence of imprisonment for life in a murder conviction in the Cayman Islands “is cruel and unusual punishment.”
On the night of 10 October, 2008, Mrs. Roberts was celebrating her 33rd birthday with female friends at Decker’s Restaurant, having already celebrated with her husband two nights earlier. She was last seen walking toward to the rear of a vehicle parked farthest away from the West Bay Road. She was driven to an isolated area of West Bay where she was raped, robbed, killed and had her body incinerated in her car.
Legal minds discuss crime issues
Attorneys general in Britain and its overseas territories are faced with a growing crime problem on two fronts, people gathered at a high profile conference at the Grand Cayman Marriott Beach Resort were told.
First, financial criminals are becoming more sophisticated in the ways they steal, with the proceeds of their crime often going to fuel other illegal activities, including gang warfare, drugs or terrorist activities. Second, violent street crime has recently escalated to levels not seen before in either the United Kingdom or its territories.
Shootings, killings and armed robberies aren’t just a problem unique to Grand Cayman, Solicitor General for England and Wales Edward Garnier, told several dozen conference attendees.
Mr. Garnier said the past year has been a difficult time for governments around the world as the global economic downturn has persisted.
UK cops visit Cayman
Veteran police investigators from northwest England arrived in Grand Cayman after their commanders spent the week with Royal Cayman Islands Police Service brass hashing out strategies to use them in the fight against surging gang violence.
Merseyside Police Chief Constable Jon Murphy said during a news briefing the group of 20 officers – to be paid for by the Cayman Islands government – had an initial six-week contract and that the team wasn’t planning on staying beyond that.
The police officers from the United Kingdom arrived in the wake of five killings in nine days in Grand Cayman, after authorities here reached out for assistance in dealing with the escalating violence.
RCIPS Commissioner David Baines said Governor Duncan Taylor was also looking at recruiting a forensic evidence specialist and a legal adviser to help assist local police in preparing criminal cases, but he wasn’t aware that anyone had been placed in those posts yet.
Back home, the UK police officers were chastised by the British media during their stay in the Cayman Islands for what a few publications deemed was a trip to the Caribbean for some sun, sand and sea – but little work. Authorities denied the allegations and maintained publicly that the trip to Grand Cayman had yielded tangible results.
Teen prisoners strip searched
Two officers at Her Majesty’s Prison Fairbanks were disciplined earlier this year following a December strip search of three female inmates in a prison dorm.
The search was made 4 December, 2010, one day after a few of the inmates had written complaint letters concerning certain prison policies in which also alleged laziness or inactivity on the part of some of the prison officers.
Findings following an investigation by the government Portfolio of Internal and External Affairs indicated prison officers acted on good intelligence regarding the illegal use of cell phones in prisons. Although the methods used In the strip searches of the inmates may not have been advisable, the agency said it found no evidence the search was done in retaliation.
Cayman Islands Complaints Commissioner Nicola Williams later disagreed with the government’s Portfolio of Internal and External Affairs and issued a finding determining the strip search was done in retaliation for the prisoners writing complaint letters about prison guards.
Kittiwake shifts
Strong waves generated by Hurricane Rita shifted the former USS Kittiwake wreck about 60 feet out to sea, divers at the site reported in late October.
Followign the storm, the ship was sitting in 10 feet deeper water and was closer to the sea wall.
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