THE OPPOSITION Antigua Labour Party is alerting regional and hemispheric organisations to what it claims to be a serious threat to the physical safety of High Court judge, Louise Blenman.
Judge Blenman’s ruling to declare vacant the parliamentary seats of Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer and two of his cabinet colleagues is currently a matter before the country’s Appeal Court.
In a statement yesterday, the ALP disclosed that following the alleged public threat at the weekend by a named cabinet minister against justice Blenman, it decided to engage in immediate alerts to key regional and hemispheric bodies.
The ALP’s letters of complaints and  requests for attention are being dispatched to the Chief Justice of the Eastern Caribbean Court and the Secretaries General of the Caribbean Community Secretariat and Organisation of American States.
Additionally, according to the party’s leader and former Prime Minister Lester Bird, excerpts of the threatening statement, attributed to the named cabinet minister, would be submitted to the country’s Commissioner of Police.
The alleged threat against judge Blenman was that had her ruling of March 31 to declare vacant, or invalid, three parliamentary seats of the governing party (United Progressive Party) been made in another CARICOM jurisdiction (named by the minister), then “she could not walk out from the court….”
Excerpts of the threat against judge Blenman as well as the allegation of Prime Minister Spencer’s “war” threat at an earlier public meeting, would be communicated by the ALP to the Chief Justice of the Eastern Caribbean Court, CARICOM and OAS Secretariats.
Following judge Blenman’s ruling, based on ALP election petitions that challenged the results of the March 2009 general election won by the UPP, another High Court judge, David Harris, had made a temporary order,–on application from the UPP–to stay the execution of declaring invalid the three relevant UPP parliamentary seats
Last week the Court of Appeal fixed June 29 to commence proceedings on the substantive issue of the irregularities that led to judge Blenman’s ruling to inform the Speaker of Parliament that three UPP seats were deemed by the court to be invalid.