BY MICHAEL ARNOLD
In a backlash to his ongoing prosecution in the committal court, lawyer Paul Paraka has filed an originating summons against a magistrate and three officers of the former police taskforce sweep team for their contempt of a 2015 Supreme Court decision.
In making the application to the Supreme Court yesterday, Mr Paraka has cemented his intentions to sue Waigani District Court principal magistrate Cosmas Bidar, former police fraud squad director Chief Inspector Timothy Gitua, current fraud squad director Chief Superintendent Matthew Damaru and fraud squad officer Senior Constable Pius Peng for failing to comply with the court decision.
In his application Mr Paraka has posited that the Supreme Court decision in question (In re Powers, Functions, Duties and Responsibilities of the Commissioner of Police [2014] PGSC 19; SC1388) confirmed the authority of the Police Commissioner in disbanding the taskforce sweep team on June 17, 2014, and subsequently any ongoing investigations. Mr Paraka had suggested that by failing to withdraw the charges, Mr Gitua and Mr Peng, as the investigating officers in three separate cases against him, had therefore acted in contempt of the Supreme Court decision.
Adding to the current application, Mr Paraka had also posited that Mr Bidar failed to uphold the decision by the Supreme Court when he ruled that the submissions by him (Paraka) to strike out one of the three cases for abuse of process were an “abuse of process” in themselves.
Moreover, a separate application within the OS is seeking to charge Mr Damaru, as the current director of the fraud squad, for contempt under section 155(6) of the Constitution, for failing to take any active steps to give effect to the police commissioners’ orders since 2014.
The court has yet to make a decision on the application, although all three defendants are expected to make their cases as the matter continues.