MONTEGO BAY, St James — Citing a far-advanced case — during the last circuit within the western end of the country— in which the jury had to be discharged, Chief Justice Bryan Sykes has again called for serious consideration to be given to judge-alone trials.

“After four weeks of trial, that was it. It was just waiting for addresses and the summation to be done [but] the jury had to be discharged,” he said during the 2026 Legal Year Western Region Assize Church Service at the West Jamaica Conference of Seventh-day Adventists in Mount Salem, St James, on Saturday.

In cases where juries are discharged Sykes’s preference is for the judge to then give a final verdict instead of having the matter drag on. He has consistently advocated for judge-alone trials in a bid to reduce case backlog and ensure that everyone accused of a crime is granted their constitutional right to a fair trial within a reasonable time. During the weekend church service he spoke of how a reliance on jury trials has impacted St James, particularly in relation to murder cases.

According to Sykes there were 170 cases before the court last circuit, and the perennial problem of finding individuals willing to serve as jurors persist.

“The judge was endeavouring to be as efficient as she could, actually running two to three trials at a time; and after four weeks of trial, [for] one of them, the jury had to be discharged,” said Sykes.

“The question is now, ‘Are we organising ourselves in a manner that justice can reach these 170 cases?’ Because it’s not just 170 persons because some of the cases have multiple defendants,” he added.

He noted that the numbers represent more than 200 people and impact not only those awaiting trial but also witnesses and relatives of the bereaved who have suffered great loss.

“We have to look again at the question of jury trials,” the chief justice urged.

Under the Criminal Justice (Administration) Act, which was amended by the Jury (Amendment) Act in 2015, the prosecution and the defence must agree, in writing, for an offence to be tried by a judge only.

As he has done in the past, Sykes on Saturday pointed to an opinion handed down by Jamaica’s highest court of final appeal, which he said should be utilised to guide the way forward.

“One of the most intriguing things to me is that the Privy Council has pointed to a solution for nearly four years now when the Adijah Palmer case went there,” he said, referencing the case of the individual widely known as dancehall artiste Vybz Kartel.

In 2024 the Privy Council overturned Kartel’s murder conviction based on its findings that the trial judge erred when, instead of discharging the entire jury, instead allowed the trial to continue with a juror who attempted to bribe others on the jury.

“What did they say? ‘If you’re going to have jury trials you can do it in such a manner that in the event that the jury must be discharged, then the trial can continue with the judge,” Sykes said of the Privy Council’s ruling in the Kartel case.

That would be a much easier approach than attempting to start over with a fresh panel of jurors or even adding alternates. Many individuals, for various reasons, shy away from serving as jurors.

On Saturday the chief justice made a fresh appeal for Jamaicans to do their civic duty and participate in the administration of justice.

“I dare say this is an appropriate place for me to repeat this again, ‘Show up when called to serve.’ So I am looking here at potential jurors who will, no doubt, be the first persons at the court in St James when you get the summons,” he quipped.

“You need to turn up and participate because our citizens — both those who are charged and those who are waiting to give evidence, those who have been the victim of violence — they need justice to be done, and you are a part of that process,” Sykes underscored.

He explained that the situation has become even more challenging given the impact on court facilities following the passage of last October’s Hurricane Melissa.

“A region does not fully recover with new buildings and new roofs, it recovers when it’s people also trust that they will be treated fairly, that their disputes will be heard, and that the law stands with them and not over them,” he told the gathering.

“Access to justice must reach every person in western Jamaica as surely as relief and rebuilding must,” he added.

Sykes pointed to the St James and Westmoreland parish court buildings as structures that have been impacted and are in need of urgent repair and redevelopment to serve the needs of the people. He noted that the St James Parish Court has for years had serious flooding issues. Despite these challenges, he urged members and partners of the legal fraternity who interact with the system to play their part in improving its efficiency.

“Justice restored in this region will not be the achievement of the judiciary alone, it depends on every arm of the profession pulling in the same direction. I ask that we examine our own practices,” he said.

“Too often the delay in our courts are not the faults of the bench. And I am not saying that the bench is never at fault, but what I am saying [is that] in many instances it is not the fault of the bench but documents come too late, incomplete, or not at all,” he lamented, adding that this must change.