The United Kingdom’s Privy Council has recommended that Justice Priya Levers be removed from office for misbehaviour and an inability to carry out the functions of her role as a Grand Court judge in Cayman.

The Privy Council’s Judicial Committee published its findings on its website on Thursday, 29 July, after considering the judge’s conduct of court proceedings, her relationship with Chief Justice Anthony Smellie and her attitude toward fellow judges.

The committee stated that it was “most concerned with those occasions when [Justice Levers] has been guilty in court of completely inexcusable conduct that have given the appearance of racism, bias against foreigners and bias in favour of the defence in criminal cases.

“They have been fatal flaws in a judicial career that has had many admirable features,” it said.

In its advice, published following a four-day hearing in London last month, the Privy Council determined that Justice Levers had shown “bias and contempt for Jamaicans” and demonstrated misbehaviour that would “of itself, have justified her removal from office”.

The committee was referring to a grievous bodily harm case Justice Levers heard in which she asked why the victim, the Jamaican girlfriend of the defendant, had not been sent “home”, described her as “a woman like that” after hearing she was married to a Caymanian, and accused her of “spreading her goodwill around”, which the committee said was a “clear allegation of promiscuity”.

The committee described the judge’s comments about the victim as “monstrous”.

The Privy Council found that the judge was also guilty of serious misconduct on three occasions in cases heard in Family Court.

“She made offensive and racist comments to a Canadian mother..., demonstrated a similar attitude in suggesting that a Filipino mother go back to the Philippines and made a remark... which would be perceived as outrageously racist and would be wholly unacceptable from the bench anywhere in the world,” a summary of the Privy Council’s report stated.

The seven-member committee found that critical comments Justice Levers made about fellow judges on two occasions in court constituted “serious misconduct” in one case and were “inappropriate” in the other.

The report said that evidence from a number of witnesses showed that after May 2007, Justice Levers had formed a powerful dislike of the Chief Justice and some fellow judges. “She had disparaged them in private conversations with others involved in court administration, which crossed the line from indiscretion to become misconduct, although not misbehaviour justifying removal from office on its own,” it said.

The committee, having read statements from many colleagues and friends attesting to the judge’s good qualities, stated: “[Justice Levers] has high standards and shows strong disapproval for those whom she does not consider measure up to them. That disapproval has extended both to some who have appeared in her court and to her own colleagues.

“Unfortunately she has not kept that disapproval to herself. It has led her repeatedly to make in court comments that have ranged from the inappropriate to the outrageous about those who have appeared before her and, on two occasions, about her judicial colleagues.”

The report stated that the Privy Council committee was satisfied that “by her misconduct [Justice Levers] showed that she was not fit to continue to serve as a judge of the Grand Court and humbly advises Her Majesty that she should be removed from that office on the ground of her misbehaviour.”

In May 2009, a judicial tribunal into Justice Levers’ behaviour was held in Cayman. The tribunal was convened by former governor Stuart Jack following a complaint from Chief Justice Smellie. The three members of that tribunal recommended that the judge be removed from office. Their findings and the transcript of the tribunal hearing were passed on to the Privy Council for consideration.

The Privy Council took exception to some of the comments made by the judicial tribunal in relation to Justice Levers, saying it was not appropriate for it to castigate Justice Levers’ conduct in the “extreme terms” adopted in the tribunal’s executive summary.

“It is one thing for an investigating tribunal to identify conduct that it considers amounts to misbehaviour justifying removal. It is quite another to do so in terms that may irreparably damage the reputation of a judge before her conduct has been appraised by the Judicial Committee,” it said.

The final determination of whether Justice Levers, who was suspended by Mr. Jack in September 2008, will be removed permanently from office lies with the current governor Duncan Taylor and the Queen.

Head of the Governor’s Office, Steve Moore, said Thursday that the Privy Council’s advice was to the Queen and Mr. Taylor, who is off island until Monday.

Mr. Moore said: “Her Majesty and, in turn, her representative in the Cayman Islands would need to consider that advice and take what action is necessary.”

Justice Levers’ lawyer, Anthony Akiwumi, did not respond to a request for comment by press time.