About 2 and a half months ago, 7News told you about the Belizean case which was heard in Barbados before the Caribbean Court of Justice.
This case involved a judgment, which was handed down by the Supreme Court of Belize. One of six former employees of the Mayan King Banana Farm alleged that in June 2001 the company terminated them because they were leading a recruitment drive for the Christian Worker's Union.
They claimed union-busting, and Justice Awich agreed with them when he ruled in 2009 against Mayan King Banana Farm, which is owned by John Zabaneh. He awarded the 6 employees a total of $420,000
Well, Zabaneh appealed that decision, but the Court of Appeal dismissed that claim, and added that there was evidence of injury to feelings. However, they did reduce the award to $180,000.
In April of this year, Zabaneh's attorney, Eamon Courtenay, went all the way to Barbados to appeal the Court of Appeal's decision before the CCJ.
Today, the CCJ handed down its decision on that appeal via teleconference, and 7News was there.
Afterwards, we spoke to Courtenay outside of court, and he explained that while the CCJ dismissed the appeal, his client also gained some measure of victory out of decision.
Eamon Courtenay - Attorney for the Appellant
"Well, the Caribbean Court of Justice just delivered it's decision, and the actual written judgement will be sent to us by email and therefore, we haven't had a chance to read it yet. But the decision that they announced is that they dismissed the appeal, and varied the award from the Court of Appeal. The Court of Appeal had awarded each defendant - 6 of them - 30 thousand dollars. They have varied that and reduced it to 15 thousand each and 1 month's salary each except for one of them. They gave that person 3 months' salary. So, from the client's perspective. The initial judgment of Justice Awich was 420 thousand dollars. And after the court of appeal, it went down to 218, and now a quick calculation from the CCJ will bring it to about 100 thousand dollars."
"What we were arguing was - first of all - was that there was no union busting. And we also argued that the Court of Appeal had said that there was injury to feelings, and therefore gave each of the claimants 30 thousand dollars. We said that there was no evidence of injury to feelings. I don't know what is the basis on which the CCJ has now given 15 thousand dollars, but certainly, we say that there was no evidence of injury to feeling. Unfortunately, as I said, we haven't received the hardcopy, and when we do, then we'll be able to understand the basis on which the CCJ has come up with 15 thousand dollars each."
So at this stage, which the CCJ has upheld the decision of the Supreme Court, but the award has been reduced from an initial 420 thousand dollars, to approximately 100 thousand dollars. We would hazard a guess that with legal fees - the total paid out by Maya King would not be far off from the original award.
This decision stands as final because, as we said, the CCJ is the highest court of appeal in Belize.
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