The Guyana Defence Force (GDF) late yesterday acted on a court order handed down by Acting Chief Justice Ian Chang on Thursday, which had ordered the immediate release from detention of one of its officers, Captain Ronald Hope.

The order was served directly on Chief-of-Staff Commodore Gary Best last Friday morning, after Hope’s attorneys Gregory Gaskin, Trenton Lake and Chandra Persaud successfully obtained it in the High Court.

And concerns were beginning to be raised among the local legal fraternity when well past midday yesterday it was learnt that the GDF officer, who ever since he was arrested in August last year, was still being detained.

Hope is being tried before a military court for the alleged unlawful uplifting of a semi-automatic pistol, the property of the GDF, from its Camp Stephenson, Timehri arms store on August 27, 2009, and faces a lone charge of, ‘conduct to the prejudice of good order and military discipline contrary to Section 75 of the Defence Act, Chapter 15:01 of the Laws of Guyana’.

The ongoing court-martial, the second being faced by the officer, commenced on January 5 last, with Lieutenant Colonel K. Persaud sitting as the Court’s President and Retired High Court Judge Oslen Small as its Judge Advocate.

It had however again been halted on submissions of alleged procedural irregularities by the officer’s attorneys.

And today, Justice Small, in the absence of the President and rest of the panel, will at the request of the Army officer’s attorneys, conduct a voir dire (a trial within a trial), to determine whether investigations leading up to the Summary of Evidence that were conducted to determine whether the court-martial to try the Army officer is properly founded.

The first court-martial proceeding had commenced in October 2009 with Lieutenant Colonel Wilbert Lee as the President and Justice Winston Moore serving as the Judge Advocate.

It was Justice Moore who in December last, upon submissions by Hope’s attorneys, Gaskin, Lake and Leslie Sobers, of irregular procedures conducted by the GDF, had advised that the trial be discontinued and declared a nullity.

Justice Moore had also advised the GDF that they also had two options at hand, that they could have re-instituted the charge against the officer but have it done properly, or accept his request to be SOS (Struck off Strength).

The Army opted for the first option, hence the ongoing trial.
It is the second time that Hope’s attorneys have had to seek redress in the High Court.
When Hope was arrested on August 28 last, he was placed under close arrest; and on November 2, that restriction was relaxed to one of open arrest, but he still was not allowed to leave the base.
On November 11, the High Court ruled that Hope’s open arrest (detention) was an illegal act and the Army allowed him conditional freedom. He was allowed to leave Base Camp Ayanganna, but had to report by 10:00h daily.

The officer’s freedom was however short-lived as he was re-arrested by the GDF four days later.