United Progressive Party (UPP) senator Damani Tabor has sued the government, seeking damages in connection with his 2016 arrest and detention.
In the claim filed on Tuesday, Tabor, who is also the party’s PRO, alleges he was falsely arrested and imprisoned, and maliciously prosecuted.
The senator’s arrest followed statements he made on radio about monies allegedly missing from the Citizenship by Investment Programme (CIP), claims the government said were false and forwarded to the police for action.
Tabor was arrested and subsequently charged with making a false statement and public mischief but the charges were dismissed by the court.
The prosecution had appealed the dismissal but this was ultimately abandoned. In his action, Tabor claims that the non-existence of the offence of public mischief meant that his detention amounted to false arrest and false imprisonment.
Further, the claim stated, both his father, attorney Charlesworth Tabor, and the Director of Public Prosecutions had informed the police that the offence of public mischief did not exist. The offence of making a false statement had already been declared unconstitutional by the Privy Council in the Tim Hector v. Attorney General of Antigua and Barbuda et al case in 1990.
Accordingly, Tabor is claiming that the move to the court amounted to malicious prosecution.
(More in today’s Daily Observer)