Legislation Passed To Validate Payments Made To Legal Aid Lawyers

The Legal Aid (Fees) (Validation and Indemnification) Act 2021 was passed in the House of Representatives on Tuesday (June 22).

The Bill seeks to validate the payments made to attorneys-at-law who provided legal-aid services in the R v Uchence Wilson and Others trial, as well as the R v Carlington Godfrey and Others trial.

In piloting the legislation, Minister of Justice, Hon. Delroy Chuck, explained that in the case of the R v Uchence Wilson and Others trial, 25 persons were arrested and charged in 2019 with offences under the Criminal Justice (Suppression of Criminal Organisations) Act, commonly called the Anti-Gang legislation, for the commission of gang-related offences.

He said that these persons were allegedly a part of a major organised criminal network dubbed the ‘Uchence Wilson Gang’.

Minister Chuck noted that these accused persons sought assistance for their defence under the Legal Aid Act, and it was indicated that given the complexity, the number of defendants and the large number of witnesses, the trial would require the focus of legal counsel assigned to the defendants, to the exclusion of other matters in their legal practice.

He said it was anticipated that the trial would take three months to complete, and the attorneys-at-law expressed that a trial of that magnitude would require considerably more resources than the existing tariff of fees.

“The trial could not commence, as the Legal Aid Council was unable to assign attorneys-at-law willing to undertake the matter on behalf of the accused without a significant increase in the fees being offered, commensurate to the unprecedented level of work being undertaken,” he indicated.

“As a result, this situation threatened the defendants’ right to a fair trial. When I was advised of this pressing issue, and to circumvent this impasse, consultations were had with the Council and attorneys-at-law and it was determined that the best way forward was to vary the tariff of fees,” Minister Chuck noted.

He advised that a tariff was worked out where in the first month, senior attorneys would receive $600,000, and $450,000 for the junior attorneys.

“In those circumstances, we said, after the first month you will get $500,000 and $400,000, not for more than [the] three months we were anticipating. However, what took place is that after three months, we recognised that it would go to six months,” Mr. Chuck said.

The trial went on continuously for six months at which point, a decision was made to put a cap on the payments made to the attorneys.

In all, the Uchence Wilson trial continued intermittently for 19 months. The total payment disbursed to the 28 attorneys-at-law amounted to $55,350,000.

In the case of R v Carlington Godfrey and Others, the trail lasted for six months from January 2020 to July 2020.

The payment made to 14 attorneys in December 2020, was in the amount of $10,500,000.

Mr. Chuck said the duration of the Uchence Wilson and the Carlington Godfrey trials was 25 months with a combined total of 34 defendants, and 42 attorneys representing the defendants in both trials. The overall sum of payments made in both matters amounted to $65,850,000.

“Having made those payments, which were outside the Legal Aid tariff, we are asking the House to validate what was done because it was outside the Legal Aid Act,” the Minister said.