Barbados: Videoconferencing to be introduced in courts

(Barbados Nation) – The days of victims of crime costing the government and people of Barbados thousands of tax-payer dollars to fly them back to country to provide evidence in the courts of law may soon be a thing of the past.

The country intends to introduce videoconferencing as part of the judicial process, once the required changes are made to the legislation, mainly the Evidence Act.

The Royal Barbados Police Force Commissioner, Darwin Dottin, in an interview, revealed that the nation’s police would lead the charge in allowing people who were victims of crime but had to leave before arrests could be made or the start of trials, to have their evidence heard live from their country of residence via videoconferencing.

For decades, the country’s coffers were reduced when government was forced to pay for air travel in order for victims to give their evidence in the Magistrates’ Court for preliminary hearings or in the Supreme Court.