Pratt v Morgan

In the English speaking Caribbean territories, Privy Council jurisdiction, no prisoner can be kept on death row for more than five years, otherwise “there would be strong grounds for believing that the delay is such as to constitute inhuman or degrading punishment or treatment.” {{more}} This precedent was set by the Privy Council decision in the Jamaican case of Pratt and Morgan in 1993. This raised the issue of delays, not by the appellant, but by others in the judiciary responsible for carrying out certain procedures.

You have heard the names Pratt and Morgan time and time again. It is the object of this article to explain the significance of the case in criminal matters. I would, therefore, give a short synopsis of the background information and the reasoning of their Lordships of the Privy Council.

Background

Earl Pratt and Ivan Morgan committed murder in Jamaica on October 6th, 1977. They were convicted and sentenced to death on January 15th, 1979, and were placed on death row. Subsequently, they appealed their sentences in the Court of Appeal in Jamaica, but their cases were dismissed. Their fate was decided by the Privy Council sixteen years after they were in prison, and fourteen years after they were on death row. During the time they were on death row, preparations were made for their execution on three occasions. On those occasions, they were actually taken to the condemn cell, close to the gallows, when stays of execution were granted. The delays were essentially outside the control of the condemned men, and were, among other things, the failure to issue a legal aid certificate at an earlier date so as to have counsel assigned to the matter before the Court of Appeal. In fact, the appeal was listed for hearing before the Court of Appeal before the certificate was issued. After the Court of Appeal dismissed their appeal, the intimation in writing to the Governor General of an intention to apply to the Judicial Council of the Privy Council was not done as required by Privy Council Instructions of 1962.

Their Lordships’ arguments

Accordingly, their Lordships found that any person of normal sensitivity and compassion would be moved by “the agony of mind that these men must have suffered as they alternate between hope and despair in the 14 years that they have been in prison facing the gallows.”

To start with, their Lordships looked at the death penalty in the United Kingdom and found that it had always been carried out expeditiously. They claim that delays in terms of years in the United Kingdom were unheard of as an appeal to the House of Lords could be put into effect within a few weeks. They noted that the average time “for a delay was six weeks if there was an appeal and three weeks if there was not one.” They were in no doubt that if an inordinate delay had occurred in England that the judges would have stayed execution to enable the prerogative of mercy to be exercised and the sentence commuted to one of life imprisonment.

They referred to a statement by Mr. Winston Churchill to the effect that people ought not to be brought up to execution or believe that they are to be executed time after time.

They gave a chronology of the case, and pointed to the delays that occurred. They noted that the colonies had a strict timetable for appeals, and that they were enforced in Jamaica before and after independence. Despite the timetable, it took two years for the matter to reach the Jamaican Court of Appeal for a hearing.

Ada Johnson is a solicitor and barrister-at-law.
E-mail address is: exploringthelaw@yahoo.com