Court says CITCO must pay for wall
Brian Brown was by his own admission no angel…but when authorities broke down the wall around his yard for being higher than City Council regulations allowed, he decided to fight back. Not with an AK47, but with his lawyer. Today the Supreme Court ruled that Brown had been unconstitutionally targeted. Attorney Dean Barrow explains.
Dean Barrow, Attorney for Brian Brown
“The Chief Justice found that the law, the statutory instrument passed by the City Council which purported to give authority for the demolition of fences above a certain height that didn’t comply with certain specifications, that law is invalid; it’s null and void. It is, as I had argued, “Ultra vires”, outside of the scope of the authority conferred by the Belize City Council Act, which is the parent law–which is what gives the City Council the power to make by-laws by virtue of a statutory instrument. What the Chief Justice said is that they went too far, they went well beyond what the enabling power entitled them to do.”
The ruling means that nobody in the city with walls over four feet high–including at least one City Councillor–need worry about prosecution. The court ordered that the City Council not only repair Brown’s wall, but also pay him twenty thousand dollars in damages, as well as five thousand dollars in legal fees.
And while on the subject of unconstitutional laws, Barrow the lawyer and Leader of the Opposition could not help comment on the latest efforts by the Minister of Natural Resources and Attorney General to defend the recently passed Chalillo bill
Dean Barrow, Attorney for Brian Brown
“That law is without a doubt, in my view, unconstitutional. Perhaps the Deputy Prime Minister is making a political argument-and I won’t get into that-it seems to me that he concentrates more on the merits of Chalillo rather than on the question of the constitutionality of the law. But the Attorney General has certainly mounted a full-fledged defence of the constitutionality of the law. I will not get personal, so I will limit myself to saying that I think what he is talking is legally utter nonsense and I don’t see that that position would be sustained by any court.”
“Clearly, the government has flung down the gauntlet and I am sure that they will try to get the best possible legal resources to defend the law when it is challenged. And I don’t want to give the impression that there won’t be a hell of a fight. Lawyers are skilled persons and their ingenuity is almost limitless, so they will pray in aid all sorts of things to try and defend the law, but in my humble opinion there is no doubt at all that that law has to be unconstitutional.
The ruling means that nobody in the city with walls over four feet high–including at least one City Councillor–need worry about prosecution. The court ordered that the City Council not only repair Brown’s wall, but also pay him twenty thousand dollars in damages, as well as five thousand dollars in legal fees.
