From: Kaieteur News.Written by Denis Scott Chabrol Monday, 05 March 2012 14:55
The volumes of Kaieteur News in the High Court room in January. They were later rejected by Justice Reynolds, usable only if there was "greater particularity"
An Office of the President witness in the libel case between former President, Bharrat Jagdeo and newspaper columnist, Freddie Kissoon failed to show up in court on Monday and the defence lawyers were awarded costs totaling GUY$40,000.
Defence Lawyer, Nigel Hughes also signaled that if the witness does not appear in court on April 16 at 9:30 AM, he would request that Jagdeo’s lawyer, Senior Counsel Bernard Dos Santos closes his case.
Back on January 27,2011 Dos Santos had gotten Office of the President, Media Officer Rawle Kissoon to tender several binders of Kaieteur News editions from June 2012 to January 2012. The plaintiff’s lawyer, in his quest for exemplary damages, wants to lead evidence to show that Frederick Kissoon had a “morbid obsession” with maligning Jagdeo before and during the lawsuit.
Justice Brassington Reynolds upheld the application by Hughes and awarded costs of GUY$20,000 each to him (Hughes) and fellow Attorney-at-Law, Christopher Ram.
The High Court, however, expressed his “displeasure” at the failure of the witness to appear after Dos Santos told the court that he surmised that the man might be ill.
“I have not had personal contact with him or his employer. Mr. Kissoon has not shown up for work today and I am unable to account for his whereabouts,” Dos Santos told the court.
Hughes noted that Dos Santos could not say definitively whether the Office of the President functionary’s purported illness was “grounded in reality.”
After Hughes applied for cost, Dos Santos conceded that “I find myself with my back against the ropes, so to speak.” Justice Reynolds, in awarding the costs, noted that there was precedent for doing so.
Justice Reynolds on January 30 refused to admit several volumes of Kaieteur News newspapers into evidence for exemplary damages in the Bharrat Jagdeo versus Freddie Kissoon libel case, saying that it would be too tedious and there were no specific instances cited. The Judge has said that it was not for him to go through the dozens of newspapers but rather it was the lawyers who should furnish sufficient actions contained to prove malice in a manner concerned.
Jagdeo filed the case against newspaper columnist and academic, Freddie Kissoon, Kaieteur News Editor Adam Harris and the newspaper’s publisher, Glen Lall, claiming more than GUY$10 million in damages.
Jagdeo believes that he was libeled in a Kissoon article titled , ‘King Kong sent his goons to disrupt the Conference’, which refers to the Guyanese leader as an ideological racist. In the article published on June 28, 2010, Kissoon was alluding to the near-break up of the annual historical conference at the National Library by persons who had heckled pro-government sentiments when he was about to deliver his presentation.
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