Social activist Jeremy Enriquez is welcoming a recent Caribbean Court of Justice ruling that clarifies how appeals should be filed in Belize and how wasted costs orders should be handled. The CCJ ruled in Enriquez’s favor on two of three appeals tied to his challenge of Belize’s electoral boundaries. The court found that his notice of appeal was valid. It also overturned an order that would have forced Senior Counsel Anand Ramlogan to personally pay part of the government’s legal costs, saying he was not given proper notice or a fair chance to respond. But the CCJ dismissed a third appeal linked to an ex parte order from the High Court. The court said Enriquez should have first asked the High Court to vary or discharge that order before appealing. Enriquez says the judgment is encouraging because it pushes the High Court to focus more on the merits of cases, rather than shutting them down on legal technicalities.
Jeremy Enriquez, Social Activist
“We feel that there was a serious misconduct by the judge when he discussed our case during the lunch break before we had completed our submissions. As a result of our calling out the judge for his misconduct, he went ahead to issue a wasted cost in wanting my attorney to pay half the state’s fees, legal fees. He issued also – there was also the issue of our filing for an appeal that went to the technicality to try to say that we did not file properly because there was a – the registrar did not sign the appeal, and we contested that and the Caribbean Court of Justice turned overrule the court of appeal on the wasted cost.”
While the ruling does not decide the electoral boundaries case itself, it marks an important legal win for Enriquez and his legal team.
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