The MSP was set up in February 2009 by the Liberian Supreme Court and the Ministry of Justice as an emergency method to combat the problems of prolonged pre-trial detention and prison overcrowding. The MSP places magistrates from six magisterial courts within Montserrado County in the prison compound of Monrovia Central Prison to hold pre-trial hearings six days per week (one court each day). While the MSP has been successfully processing and releasing detainees on a daily basis, there are a number of challenges facing the program that greatly reduce its efficiency and ultimately its effectiveness. As a result of the problems and obstacles affecting the MSP, the number of detainees released each day is often not able to counterbalance the number of admitted detainees; thus, the prison population remains high.
The MSP Human Rights Workshop aimed to address problems within the structures and procedures of the MSP by building on the skills and knowledge of the key actors involved in its implementation. Together with local judges and advocates, Professor Speedy Rice and four students from Washington & Lee University travelled to Monrovia to give some of the trainings. As one of the organisers of the two-day workshop, I had the privilege of observing the workshop in action. In this post, I provide an insight into some of the sessions that I was able to watch.
1. Human Rights and Rights of Pre-Trial Detainees
During this session, the Washington & Lee students outlined the rights of pre-trial detainees through a mixture of skits, games, and a formal presentation.
Participants were asked to list as many rights of pre-trial detainees as possible. However, before participants were allowed to speak, they first had to pick a card out of a hat. All cards in the hat were previously marked “Pre-Trial Detainee” or left blank. If a participant drew a blank card, they were permitted to speak. If a “Pre-Trial Detainee” card was selected, the participant lost their right to speak. The idea was to compare the treatment and human rights of citizens versus detainees. By excluding those participants who drew the “Pre-Trial Detainee” cards, the participant was made to feel like a pre-trial detainee who was being denied his or her human rights. After the hat game, a small leaflet was distributed listing human rights that belong to everyone in Liberia. The document referred to the relevant provisions of the Liberian Constitution and Criminal Procedure Law. The students then proceeded to deliver a presentation on the nature and importance of these rights, pointing to international, regional and domestic legislation.
The session ended with a small presentation by Professor Speedy Rice on the social harms of overcrowding and why overcrowding is of concern to the entire population of Liberia. First, overcrowding increases the spread of disease from prisoner to prisoner; when they then return to their communities, these individuals are likely to spread the disease within their communities. Secondly, overcrowding can reduce the faith people have in their government to be fair as well as their commitment to the rule of law. Finally, long incarceration increases violence and the number of repeat offenders whilst decreasing the ability of detainees to reintegrate into society. 2. Roles and Responsibilities of Actors in the MSP
In this session, the Washington & Lee students asked the participants to write down their roles and responsibilities on a small card which had been handed out at the beginning of the workshop. The participants were then given some hypothetical scenarios. Examples of such scenarios included “who has the responsibility to ensure that a pre-trial detainee has a lawyer” and “if a pre-trial detainee turns up at the MSP but is not on the schedule list for that day, who is responsible for the absence of the detainee’s name”. It was quite striking how many different answers were given to each question. The session was useful in highlighting just how confused all the different actors in the MSP are both about their own responsibilities and those of their colleagues. 3. Identification of Challenges to the MSP Objectives
In this session, the Washington & Lee students divided the participants into six groups. Each group was provided with a large piece of paper on which to write what they considered to be the major challenges to the effective functioning of the MSP. A representative from each group would then present the findings of his or her group to everyone. Several challenges were consistently identified, including poor record-keeping, the ineffective transfer of cases between the magisterial and circuit courts, and a lack of consistency in the application of MSP procedures between different magistrates. This session provided the basis for the presentation of a framework on how to tackle these challenges, which the students would present later in the workshop.
4. Discussion of Rules of MSP and Mock Hearing
One of my personal favourite sessions was the presentation and mock hearing given by Judge Nata of the Circuit Court. Judge Nata spoke both eloquently and candidly about the challenges faced by the MSP as well as those threatening the integrity of the Liberian judicial system in general. At one point, Judge Nata spoke of his despair at the amount of outright lying he experiences in the courtroom, exclaiming that “it has become so bad that when someone says ‘good morning’ to me, I have to check my watch just to be sure!” He also sympathised that being a lawyer was “a lonely existence” in Liberia, especially in a system where threats and intimidation against lawyers are commonplace. However, Judge Nata emphasised that lawyers had a duty to uphold the rule of law in spite of external pressures. During the session Judge Nata clarified various jurisdictional and procedural questions relating to the MSP which the participants put to him. In addition, the session ended with two mock hearings to illustrate how all actors in the program should behave in court.
Overall, I believe the MSP Human Rights Workshop was a useful tool with which to enable participants in the program to identify for themselves the challenges that are hampering its effectiveness and to come together in one room to discuss how to resolve these issues. Many of the problems can be solved by the different actors better understanding each other’s roles and better coordinating their responsibilities. It is my hope that the workshop will provide the necessary impetus for the participants in the MSP to take the initiative to improve the functioning of the program and hence increase access to justice for the many pre-trial detainees desperately awaiting their day in court.
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