Supreme Court

  The accused, Kolani Lam, is appealing a Supreme Court ruling which had rejected his application for a judge only trial.

The defence lawyer applied for bail so that Lam could be released while awaiting the appeal hearing in October.

But the acting chief justice, Vui Clarence Nelson, denied the application.

This comes after police filed an additional charge of causing grievous bodily harm which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail.

The president was also charged with one count of assault, armed with a dangerous weapon and actual bodily harm.

A district Court hearing today was called at 9am - an hour earlier than the usual start time.

Our correspondent said this was to avoid the media, and lawyers have questioned why the judiciary was giving special treatment to the judge's case.

The case returned for directions on Thursday afternoon before Chief Justice Sir Salamo Injia.

He directed parties in the case to return to court on Monday, July 18, and settle index books in the appeal before a hearing date is allocated for the appeal to be heard.  

Leave was granted by a three-judge Supreme Court bench on June 21 to hear the appeal. A stay was also granted on that day against the decision of the National Court on March 1, dismissing his judicial review.

Chief Justice Sir Salamo Injia dismissed the appeal on Thursday. However, he said the Ombudsman Commission is at liberty to file a Supreme Court review of the National Court’s decision of Jan 28, 2015.

He said if a review is filed by the Ombudsman, it will be determined on its merits.

The Ombudsman’s appeal was dismissed after the court was told that the documents for the appeal could not be located in the registry, despite a Supreme Court reference number or court file number being given for the case on March 6, 2015.

A three-man Supreme Court bench upheld the National Court decision after a long court battle of seven years.   

Clan representative, Daure Gabe Pundi, said they had been in court since 2009 and the decision of the Supreme Court dismissing the appeal of the National Court’s decision was a relief.

“We wasted a lot of money, a lot of time but we knew it was our land so sacrificed everything and came to court.  We are happy now,” said Pundi. 

The ruling came on a request filed by investigators Sept. 11 who said they wanted to question Silva about possible involvement in the scheme. Under Brazilian law, all federal politicians and some at other levels can be investigated only if the Supreme Court approves the inquiry.

In a sharply divided 4-3 ruling, the court declared the death penalty violates the state's constitution, "no longer comports with contemporary standards of decency and no longer serves any legitimate penological purpose."

The Supreme Court this week declared a decision by the newly-appointed speaker of parliament, Marcellino Pipite, to rule out the opposition's motion of no confidence against the new prime minister Sato Kilman, and ordered parliament to reconvene on Tuesday to hear it.