High Court Registrar Ossie Walsh says High Court sessions will resume sometime early in 2018

​High Court Registrar Ossie Walsh says Dominica High Court sessions will resume sometime early in 2018, although no official date has been announced. The buildings which housed the Criminal and Civil High Courts located on the Dame Eugenia Charles Boulevard both suffered significant damage from Hurricane Maria in September, and Walsh said as it relates to the Courts, there ae many intricacies to be dealt with.
 
He noted that “There are so many stakeholders, many players involved, the DPP, the Honourable Attorney General’s Chambers, lawyers out there both with respect to civil matters and criminal matters, the judges, judges’ residence, the state of the Court; what is the situation with the jurors out there? Are they all in their respective locations prior to Maria? have they been dislocated? how many have travelled abroad?
 
He said these matters have been raised internally, and the help of resident judge Justice Birnie Stephenson meant a lot to the process of returning the Courts to normalcy. He added, “Her input into the skim of things into the Court activities meant a lot the past couple of days because frankly to deal with all those issues, all the aspects of the department here is a lot and the Court activities alone is quite a great deal of work to deal with and when you have all the other Registries to deal with and trying to get things up and running, it’s a humongous task”.
 
Walsh said a plan of action is in place with reference to the recommencement of both Civil and Criminal Courts, however, an exact date cannot yet be given. However, he assured that “The schedule will be discussed at greater length internally, but there is a target to look at, in terms of the commencement of both Courts early in the New Year. I can’t give an exact date at this point, but I think we are nearer to fulfilling that objective than when Maria struck”.