Dear Editor,

There seems to be some confusion on the question of the provisional warrant that the Minister of Justice and Attorney General Senator Dorothy Lightbourne commented on in her evidence at the Commission of Enquiry. Essentially, she is saying that if the provisional warrant procedure was used, then in hindsight what occurred in the arrest of Christopher “Dudus” Coke would not have occurred because the fugitive would have been in custody while the minister considered whether to sign the authority to proceed. The provisional warrant of arrest procedure is a lawful option under the Extradition Treaty and Extradition Act in the appropriate circumstances.

While the minister would not know what the USA said to Jeremy Taylor, the member in the director of public prosecutions office with responsibility for extradition, in May 2009 he advised the USA that the best procedure was not the provisional warrant but the formal request procedure. It is for the requesting state to say that the case is one of urgency and it is the evidence of Mr Taylor that in August 2009 when the USA contacted him, and before the extradition request was in the public domain, the requesting state (USA) told him that the case was one of urgency.

It is therefore most reasonable for the minister to examine what has transpired and to conclude that in hindsight the provisional warrant would have been the better advice because:

(a) The fact that the USA was asking Taylor in May 2009 which procedure they should use – formal request or provisional warrant (and it was Taylor’s evidence that the USA asked him this) – suggests that the USA was considering the provisional warrant procedure.

(b) Taylor’s evidence was that in August 2009, before the extradition request of Coke was in the public domain, when the USA (requesting state) contacted him about the Coke extradition the USA told him that the case was a case of urgency.

(c) The case of urgency is made by the requesting state, and

(d) The actions of several people wanting to by-pass the procedure and diplomatic protocol and rush the minister to sign the authority to proceed suggests urgency.

Therefore, for anyone to say that Minister Lightbourne is in trouble for asserting that the provisional warrant procedure was the better procedure because she says she does not know what the USA asked Jeremy Taylor in May 2009, is absolute nonsense.

Jeremy Wynter

Atlanta, Georgia

USA

jeremywynter@yahoo.com