Ramdeen v The State

Where the prosecution advances radically inconsistent accounts, the jury may be directed to consider each account separately. The prosecution may not combine them into a composite case, although the defence may use one account to challenge the other. A provocation direction requires an evidential foundation for loss of self-control; speculation or an incompatible alternative narrative is insufficient. A court must not leave a defence which has no application. Once the Privy Council is seised of a genuine appeal, it may deal with commutation where judicial delay makes execution inhuman. A separate constitutional application is not essential in those circumstances.

The appellant was convicted of murder and sentenced to death at the Port of Spain assizes. The Court of Appeal of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago dismissed her appeal against conviction, although it held that provocation should have been left to the jury and applied the proviso. The Privy Council granted permission to appeal on three grounds concerning inconsistent prosecution accounts, provocation and good character. While the conviction appeal was pending, the appellant sought permission to appeal against sentence, relying on the five-year delay principle in Pratt and Morgan v Attorney General for Jamaica [1994] 2 AC 1. The State challenged the Board’s jurisdiction, relying on Walker v The Queen [1994] 2 AC 36.

Disposition. The appeal against conviction was dismissed. By a majority of three to two, leave to appeal against sentence was granted and the death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.

1. Prosecution evidence. The trial judge was entitled to direct the jury to consider the accomplice’s evidence and the appellant’s statement as mutually exclusive prosecution cases. The prosecution could not combine the radically inconsistent accounts or use the statement as corroboration of the accomplice. The defence remained entitled to rely on the statement to cast doubt on the accomplice’s evidence. The directions were clear, fair and appropriate.
2. Provocation. Section 4B of the Offences Against the Person Act required an evidential foundation for loss of self-control before the issue could be left to the jury. On the account which the jury must have accepted, there was no evidence that the deceased provoked the appellant to join the attack, or that she acted out of control. The appellant’s alternative account was incompatible with the accomplice’s account and speculation could not supply the missing evidence. The trial judge was therefore correct not to leave provocation to the jury.
3. Good character. The Board did not determine whether a credibility direction was required for exculpatory parts of a statement where the accused did not give evidence and claimed that the statement was fabricated. The point arose only if the provocation ground succeeded.
4. Sentence jurisdiction. Lord Toulson, with Lords Neuberger and Kerr agreeing, held that the Board was seised of the case through the conviction appeal. It therefore had jurisdiction under section 14 of the Constitution of Trinidad and Tobago to address commutation arising from the appellate process, including delay making execution inhuman. Walker v The Queen [1994] 2 AC 36 was distinguishable because there was no appeal to the Board to which the commutation issue could be attached. The reasoning in Matthew v State of Trinidad and Tobago [2005] 1 AC 433, together with the analogous course in State v Pitman [2013] Cr App No 44 of 2004, supported the result. The death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
5. Dissent. Lord Mance, with Lord Sumption agreeing, considered that the Board lacked jurisdiction. In their view, the Constitution provided complete local remedies through the President and the High Court, and a failed conviction appeal could not confer an originating jurisdiction on the Board.

• Privy Council: The appeal against conviction was dismissed. Leave to appeal against sentence was granted and the death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment under Constitution of Trinidad and Tobago section 14. See [2014] UKPC 7.
• Court of Appeal of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago: Appeals against conviction were dismissed on 26 February 2010. The court held that provocation should have been left to the jury but applied the proviso and upheld the conviction.
• Port of Spain assizes: The appellant was convicted of murder and sentenced to death on 29 July 2008.