And while that dispute is far from over, Barrow, or his brother, is dealing with another. As we told you yesterday BEL is asking the Court of Appeals to set aside a judgment on which Justice of Appeal Denys Barrow sat on the panel of judges. The appeal involved the PUC and BEL argues that because Barrow’s son Kimano is a Commissioner of the PUC and because the PUC has also in the past retained the law firm of Barrow and Company, Justice Barrow did not have the appearance of impartiality. Today Justice Barrow’s brother said that in his opinion, application to the court is going nowhere.
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“He sits as one of three and I think there are clear rules in terms of codes of conduct that would govern judges and those that deal with things like a judge not sitting if a close family member is appearing. For example he would not be able to sit if Leisje, Chung, or Naima Badillo Barrow is appearing. I don’t think he would be able to sit if Deanne Barrow, my daughter, his niece, is appearing, things like that and he is a first rate lawyer and a first rate jurist and I am absolutely sure that if there were even the slightest chance that his sitting in that case might come close to violating any rule he would not have sat so I think that’s nonsense.”
Jules Vasquez,
“But can’t you see that he was appearing in a case in which a family member who is a commissioner of the PUC….”
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“But there are no personal interests. We are talking about a commission, an institutional body on which his son sits as a commission so there is no personal interest involved at all and I will say that Mr. Justice of Appeal Barrow knows not just the rules, will know the atmospheric in which these rules are crafted and are to be vindicated and I have every confidence that if he sat it was because he was perfectly entitled to sit.”
Justice Barrow is in Geneva Switzerland where he sits on the ILO’s Committee of Experts.
