{"id":334164,"date":"2024-12-14T23:56:51","date_gmt":"2024-12-15T03:56:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dominicanewsonline.com\/news\/?p=334164"},"modified":"2024-12-14T23:56:51","modified_gmt":"2024-12-15T03:56:51","slug":"pm-skerrit-wades-into-jonathan-lehrer-bail-controversy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dominicanewsonline.com\/news\/homepage\/homepage-carousel\/pm-skerrit-wades-into-jonathan-lehrer-bail-controversy\/","title":{"rendered":"PM Skerrit wades into Jonathan Lehrer bail controversy"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
(Starting from left) PM Skerrit, Rayburn Blackmoore, Jonathan Lehrer<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit has added his voice to an ongoing controversy over remarks made by National Security Minister, Rayburn Blackmoore, in relation to the granting of bail to double murder-accused Jonathan Lehrer.<\/p>\n

Speaking at a press conference on Friday, Skerrit said Blackmoore was within his right to comment on the matter and he doesn’t understand what the hoopla is all about.<\/p>\n

“I really don’t see what is the big hoopla,” he said. The controversy began in late November when the court opened bail for Lehrer. Blackmoore swiftly condemned the move saying the state “is totally opposed to the granting of bail\u201d to Lehrer.<\/p>\n

Soon after that, the Dominica Bar Association (DBA) jumped in saying that it was concerned over the minister\u2019s statement and called on public officials to refrain from questioning the independence of the judiciary. The DBA was supported by the Organization of Commonwealth Caribbean Bar Associations (OCCBA), which also expressed concerns describing Blackmoore\u2019s statement as \u201cmost unfortunate and disturbing.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his Friday press conference, Skerrit said Blackmoore was simply “highlighting the position of the prosecutors, the state prosecutors who opposed bail before the high court.”<\/p>\n

“I really don’t see, in all fairness to Mr Blackmoore, I really don’t see why was there a need for the bar association or this regional grouping to issue a statement,” he remarked. “I mean, anybody in the society has a right to express any view or concern in regards to the operation of any court….as always you have to do so respectfully and within reason.”<\/p>\n

According to the Prime Minister, there have been people in Dominica who said that the government was in collusion with Lehrer and it was going to interfere in the court proceedings to allow him to go free.<\/p>\n

“I didn’t hear anybody say that the government couldn’t interfere with the court,” he stated. “I didn’t hear the bar association say that this could not happen, this cannot happen but the minister expressing a particular view saying he is opposed and the government is opposed because the government, the state, the executive is represented by the Director of Public Prosecutions and the special prosecutor who was brought in to prosecute the case on the behalf of the state. So it wasn’t a situation where Mr Blackmoore is expressing a view [divergent] to what the state prosecutors were saying.”<\/p>\n

He added, “And if this is a matter that has occupied the minds of the general public, the public has a particular interest in this because of the extenuating circumstances of this case, because of all the negative PR that we received externally and locally from this matter, I don’t see why we should be raising alarms by the content of Mr Blackmoore’s statement.”<\/p>\n

However, Skerrit did depart from Blackmoore’s approach to the entire matter saying Blackmoore should not have responded to different groups that had to say something to say about it.<\/p>\n

“That’s the only departure,” he said. “You made a statement and you finish with that. I would not respond to the bar association, I would not respond to this regional grouping or anybody else. A statement was made and that’s it.”<\/p>\n

He also said that in his opinion, Blackmoore did not impute any motive nor was he disrespectful to anyone. “I just don’t agree with the back-and-forth,” Skerrit remarked.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit has added his voice to an ongoing controversy over remarks made by National Security Minister, Rayburn Blackmoore, in relation to the granting of bail to double murder-accused Jonathan Lehrer. Speaking at a press conference on Friday,…","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":334165,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_cbd_carousel_blocks":"[]","footnotes":""},"categories":[19,235,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-334164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-crime-court-law","category-homepage-carousel","category-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nPM Skerrit wades into Jonathan Lehrer bail controversy - Dominica News Online<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dominicanewsonline.com\/news\/homepage\/homepage-carousel\/pm-skerrit-wades-into-jonathan-lehrer-bail-controversy\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"PM Skerrit wades into Jonathan Lehrer bail controversy - Dominica News Online\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit has added his voice to an ongoing controversy over remarks made by National Security Minister, Rayburn Blackmoore, in relation to the granting of bail to double murder-accused Jonathan Lehrer. 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