Jay Chandler v The State (No 2) (Trinidad and Tobago)

A constitutional savings clause can preserve an existing law even where it would otherwise breach protected rights. The Constitution must be read as a whole. A statutory modification provision cannot override a savings clause contained in the Constitution itself. A final appellate court should depart from a fully reasoned precedent only for very strong reasons, such as demonstrated error causing legal uncertainty or distorting the development of the law. The separation of powers and the rule of law operate through the constitutional allocation of powers and do not provide free-standing grounds to invalidate legislation. Accordingly, although the mandatory death penalty is cruel and unusual and may be disproportionate, its constitutional validity remains protected, leaving reform to Parliament.

The appellant was convicted of murder in Trinidad and Tobago and sentenced to the mandatory death penalty under section 4 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1925. The Court of Appeal upheld the conviction and sentence. The Board had previously dismissed his conviction appeal in Chandler v The State (Trinidad and Tobago) [2018] UKPC 5. His sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment.

The appeal concerned whether the 1976 Constitution required the mandatory sentence to be modified into a discretionary sentence, and whether the Board should depart from Matthew v State of Trinidad and Tobago [2004] UKPC 33 in light of the Caribbean Court of Justice decisions in Nervais v R [2018] CCJ 19 (AJ) and McEwan v Attorney General of Guyana [2018] CCJ 30 (AJ). The appellant also relied on separation of powers and rule of law principles.

1. Appeal dismissed. The Board, sitting as an enlarged panel, declined to depart from Matthew v State of Trinidad and Tobago [2004] UKPC 33. A final appellate court is not formally bound by its own decisions, but stare decisis requires very great hesitation before reopening a fully reasoned ruling. A bare majority does not weaken its authority. Departure requires satisfaction that the earlier decision was wrong and lacked a satisfactory foundation, together with a special reason beyond the present panel taking a different view. Legal uncertainty, distortion of legal development, or a material change in circumstances may justify departure, but those conditions were not established here.
2. The 1976 Constitution is the supreme law. Its savings clause preserves existing laws, including the mandatory death penalty, by disapplying sections 4 and 5 to those laws. Section 5 of the Constitution of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago Act 1976 permits modification only where an existing law is not already valid under the Constitution. It does not authorise the courts to modify a law whose validity is preserved by section 6.
3. The living-instrument doctrine may give contemporary content to broadly expressed rights, but it does not alter the meaning of a concrete constitutional savings clause. The decisions of the Caribbean Court of Justice in Nervais v R [2018] CCJ 19 (AJ) and McEwan v Attorney General of Guyana [2018] CCJ 30 (AJ) did not show that Matthew was wrongly decided. They could also be distinguished on features of the relevant constitutions and legislation.
4. The separation of powers is derived from the particular Constitution and is not a free-standing legal norm above it. The legislature may prescribe a fixed punishment for a defined offence, although it may not prescribe the punishment for an individual offender. The 1976 Constitution did not prohibit Parliament from prescribing a mandatory punishment for murder.
5. The rule of law likewise cannot be detached from the text and structure of the 1976 Constitution. Sections 4 and 5 articulate relevant protections, but section 6 saves the existing law from constitutional invalidity. The mandatory death penalty therefore remains constitutional, notwithstanding its acknowledged cruelty and potential disproportionality. Reform is a matter for Parliament.

• Privy Council: The constitutional appeal was dismissed. The Board declined to depart from Matthew v State of Trinidad and Tobago [2004] UKPC 33.
• Court of Appeal of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago: On 12 December 2013, the court upheld the appellant’s conviction and mandatory death sentence. No citation is stated in the judgment.
• Privy Council: The Board previously dismissed the appeal against conviction in Chandler v The State (Trinidad and Tobago) [2018] UKPC 5.
• Trial court: The appellant was convicted of murder on 17 August 2011 and sentenced to death.