By INDARJIT SEURAJ Saturday, October 3 2009

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AWARDED DAMAGES: Former prison inmate Sean Wallace leaves the Hall of Justice, Port-of-Spain, yesterday. ...

The conduct of a group of Prisons’ Officers involved in the beating of a prison inmate, will be reviewed by the Commissioner of Prisons and the Director of Public Prosecutions, following the award of $243,848 for the beating.

High Court Justice Andre des Vignes ordered the referral minutes after awarding $173,848 in general damages and $70,000 in exemplary damages to former inmate Sean Wallace.

“I will instruct the Registrar to refer the officers to the Commissioner of Prisons and the DPP for whatever action they see fit,” des Vignes said.

The judge also ordered that the State pay an additional $46,577.20 in legal costs incurred by Wallace.

Wallace, 44, a father of two, of #28 Sun Valley Drive, La Pastora, Santa Cruz, was serving a 30- month prison sentence when he was beaten by the officers.

The beating occurred on March 18, 2008, at the Port-of-Spain State Prison on Frederick Street, and surrounded the receipt of a bag of cigarettes which was thrown over the prison wall.

The prisoner hid the bag for another inmate, and was beaten about the body when he could not produce the bag for the officers on duty.

He had taken the officers to the area where he hid the bag, but by that time another inmate had already removed it.

In his decision at the Port-of-Spain High Court yesterday, de Vignes said that the occurrence of prisoner beatings had become far too prevalent within the prison walls.

He also noted that within the last decade, similar pay-outs for such unlawful beatings have cost the State close to $1 million.

Des Vignes adopted a chronological list of precedent to support his award, describing the attack on Wallace as “depraved and inhumane treatment.” He noted that apart from the physical injuries sustained by the victim, there was also “mental damage, humiliation and a growing sense of despair.”

During the beating, the injuries he sustained were so severe, it caused Wallace to defecate on himself, he said in a sworn affidavit submitted before the court.

Borrowing the words of a learned judged in the case of Harracksingh v Attorney General, des Vignes said the conduct of the officers involved was “oppressive, arbitrary and unprofessional.”

He also noted that one officer in question was “intoxicated with power.” This, he said, was evident when the officer refused to let up the beating even though Wallace persistently begged him to stop, choosing instead, to kick the prisoner in his face.

The award of damages to Wallace, des Vignes said, was made to deter the officers as well as others from future beatings.

“Hopefully, I will not have to read about any factual circumstances like this again,” des Vignes said.

Attorneys Mark Seepersad and Gerald Ramdeen argued the case for Wallace.