Three lawyers guilty of court contempt BY ADRIAN MATHIAS, Oct 3rd,2014. Post Courier THE Supreme Court has found three private lawyers guilty of contempt of court. They are Alfred Manase, Margaret Parua and Sam Bonner, who each owns law firms. According to information on court file, they were alleged to have drafted a consent order to be put before the Chief Justice Sir Salamo Injia who had, after contested hearing, reserved his ruling on a stay application in the Supreme Court in relation to former police commissioner Tom Kulunga’s contempt case. In determining whether their conduct hindered the course of justice – whether they attempted to influence the decision of the judge or whether the effect of their conduct was to interfere with the due administration of justice, the Supreme Court constituting Justice David Cannings, Justice Don Sawong and Justice Iowa Geita found each of the contemnor guilty of contempt of the Supreme Court, but not guilty of contempt of the National Court. Their punishment will be decided later. The contempt charges stemmed from the draft consent orders that the three lawyers had consented to, to have former police commissioner Tom Kulunga’s contempt of court case settled out of court while the case was pending determination before Deputy Chief Justice Sir Gibbs Salika in the National Court. The Supreme Court registrar, Ian Augerea had upon directions from the Chief Justice Sir Salamo Injia in August, laid formal charges on the three lawyers. A full Supreme Court trial was conducted on 27 August and September 18. Mr Manase, Mr Bonner and Ms Parua were involved (either directly or through their firm) in the hearing of an application in the Supreme Court to stay proceedings in the National Court in which a client of two of the contemnor had been convicted of contempt of court. Yesterday the Supreme Court found that each of the three lawyers had committed acts and omissions outside court that were likely to interfere with and obstruct the due administration of justice. We repeat our view that the manner in which the draft consent order was attempted to be drawn to the attention of the Chief Justice on 5 June 2014 was ill-conceived, highly irregular, in breach of the Supreme Court Rules, unprofessional, unethical, an abuse of process and disrespectful of the Court and Chief Justice, the three judges ruled. The effect of such a course of conduct could only be to interfere with the Chief Justice’s decision, to present a real risk of interference with the due administration of justice and to, in fact, interfere with that process, Justice Cannings, who read the judgment said.
Posted on: Thu, 02 Oct 2014 19:58:37 +0000
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