IAN Ramsay, the suave, urbane lawyer, whose sharp mind, quick wit and occasional rapier tongue made him into one of Jamaica’s finest criminal attorneys ever, died yesterday, from cancer.

He was 72.

Ramsay, according to Prime Minister P J Patterson, himself a lawyer, was “a lawyer’s lawyer”.

“I have lost a dear friend, a close and personal colleague,” Patterson said in a statement.

Ramsay, born in Hope Bay, Portland, studied at Cambridge University and Grays Inn in England. He dabbled in politics, serving in the early 1960s as a deputy general secretary of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and as a senator in the mid-1970s. He also served as a councillor of the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation (KSAC).

“Ian Ramsay was a most valued member of the Jamaica Labour Party, a pre-eminent lawyer of his generation,” said JLP leader, Edward Seaga, with whom Ramsay had quarrels that led him to leave politics.

But it was for his role as a lawyer and jurist — Seaga called him “the quintessential advocate” — that Ramsay, a Queen’s Counsel, was being praised yesterday. A fortnight ago, when it was clear that Ramsay was terminally ill, he was awarded the Order of Jamaica for his contribution to law.

“It is impossible to deal with him in the courtroom and not feel his gift of electricity,” said Derek Jones, the managing partner in the law firm of Myers Fletcher and Gordon and a former president of the Jamaican Bar Association. “They only made one of him.”

Ramsay was called to the bar in 1955, served as a deputy clerk of the courts and entered private practice the following year, rapidly building a reputation as an advocate of skill and high integrity.

Andre Earl, another lawyer who has observed Ramsay in the courtroom, said that there was an air of expectation everytime Ramsay got up to speak.

“When he spoke in a courtroom, all quieted to hear,” said Earl of the firm Rattray Patterson and Rattray. “He had fascinating advocacy skills.”

Denis Goffe, a respected civil lawyer, stressed that Ramsay had the respect not only of lawyers but of judges as well — a position underlined by High Court judge, Lloyd Hibbert.

“We always had good relations out of court even though we were adversaries in court,” said Hibbert, a former prosecutor. “That’s the kind of man he was… He had integrity… (and was) one of most astute lawyers in the country.”

Ramsay, who suffered from cancer of the stomach, was active until recently.

He represented the police at the commission of inquiry into last year’s violence in West Kingston and later was the lead attorney for deputy police commissioner Owen Clunie, at a Police Services Commission hearing in a charge that Clunie had improperly interfered into a drug investigation. Clunie was acquitted.

“He was uncompromising in his quest for fair-play and justice and allowed no obstacle of any kind or from any quarter to stand in his way,” Patterson said.

But while others reflected on Ramsay’s intellect and legal skills, his brother, photo-journalist, Ken Ramsay, highlighted his older sibling’s belief in love.

According to Ken Ramsay, his brother was best reflected in words that Ian had himself written as a tribute to the late former prime minister, Michael Manley: “For without love all achievement is doomed, with love even mistakes can correct themselves over time, so at the end there are tears for his errors, honour for his ambition and perpetual remembrance for his measureless love.”

“I believe this is Ian’s own epitaph,” said Ken Ramsay. “I really see him in that light.”

Ramsay is survived by his wife Rosa and five children.