Cayman needs more lawyers to speed up the work of the criminal courts, the islands’ top judge has said.
The views of Chief Justice Margaret Ramsay-Hale were backed on Monday by Richard Barton, a top lawyer and head of the Cayman Islands Legal Practitioners Association. He also called for a review of legal aid rates to make criminal work a sustainable option for the profession.
He was speaking after Ramsay-Hale warned last week that the work of the criminal courts was hampered by the lack of barristers available to represent defendants.
She said, “The courts continue to face challenges in getting their work done because there remain so few practitioners relative to the number of cases before the courts.”
Ramsay-Hale was speaking at the annual Grand Court opening ceremony in George Town on Wednesday after Scott Wainwright, the assistant director of public prosecutions, highlighted a training scheme for aspiring Caymanian lawyers.
She said the department had “a lot to be proud of”.
But she added, “I am most particularly interested, however, in your work-based learning scheme, which is designed to develop Caymanian lawyers with a keen interest in law.
“Although you hope to retain them, I hope that your office will prove a fertile training ground for young criminal barristers who hope to establish a career at the private bar because the courts continue to face challenges in getting their work done …”.
She told Wainwright, “Thank you for being the incubator for the next generation of lawyers, both public and defence.”
She said a single trial last year that lasted months had tied up four of the busiest barristers in the criminal courts, which had led to delays in other cases because they were unavailable.
Ramsay-Hale added it sometimes appeared there were more barristers employed as Crown counsel than there were at the criminal bar.
She said she looked forward to “any initiative that could see the numbers of persons practising on the other side being improved”.
Ramsay-Hale said there were 69 “ineffective trials” in Summary Court in 2024.
“This is of great concern to the magistracy. In 60% of those cases, the trials were ineffective because either the Crown or defence were not ready – I leave that there – or defence counsel was in a Grand Court matter.”
Barton said, “The honourable chief justice is to be commended for her astute observation and the need to attract and retain criminal defence practitioners.
“It is imperative for practitioners to promote mentoring and training opportunities for law students and junior lawyers that express interest.
“It is also important for experienced practitioners to remain active in criminal defence work.”
But he emphasised more needed to be done to sustain the Bar’s interest in work as defence counsel.
Barton said, “Practical measures must also be explored to ensure that practitioners remain incentivised.
“A review of legal aid rates to ensure they are sustainable and efforts to remove cost impediments should be considered.”
He said organisations such as the Legal Aid department had “worked incredibly hard” to improve the experience for criminal defence practitioners and should be recognised for the “invaluable contribution they bring to the process”.
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Or less criminals.
I will avoid any of the obvious sallys about lawyers, their excess and apparently their shortage and remind readers this is not a problem peculiar to the Islands.
In 2022, UK criminal barristers went on strike over pay and funding cuts. The strike began in June and escalated to an indefinite strike in September. The strike ended in October after the Criminal Bar Association accepted the government’s pay offer.
Barristers felt the criminal justice system was underfunded and that legal aid was “pared to the bone” They were concerned about the impact of underfunding on the quality of justice and the ability to cut trial delays .
Crime, it appeared at first blush, really didn’t pay either side of the pond.
The problem is one of long standing as only the unsuccessful criminals need lawyers after the fact and, being, unsuccessful, they don’t have the cash to pay them.
Successful criminals are already lawyered up, have probably gone legit’ and their empires self perpetuate.
Modern fiction, from John Mortimer’s “Rumpole of the Bailey” relying upon the fees from the Timpson family of professional ne-er-do-wellers to the Brummie Peaky Blinders all seem to eventually crash and burn.
Reality points us into a very different direction where behaviour currently condemned as criminal becomes so successful it is rebranded as social achievement.
Used to be possible to make a respectable living either prosecuting or defending cannabis sativa charges. Roundly condemning them one day as “entry level drugs leading to the horrors of heroin” and the next day in the same court painting a picture of one’s client as a “misguided youth tricked into selling dime bags on street corners himself a victim rather than a perp”.
Today such effort in many countries where cannabis stores exceed even coffee shops on major thoroughfares would be risible.
So crime does pay. It’s just our junior criminal barristers haven’t figured out how to cash in. Their first mistake is to involve the government.
Courting successful criminal clients needs the same dedication as courting any other future successful client; look after him/her as a start up and remember where all the metaphorical bodies are buried to ensure continued loyalty
Of course, until recently society has roundly condemned criminals and any one aiding and abetting them. Hopefully all this unreasonable prejudice has changed as the US is about to elect its first fully-fledged criminal, one with a substantial record and showing no signs of remorse, to high office.