A local police prosecutor is calling for greater respect, resources, and regional reform to support the professionalisation of prosecutors across the Caribbean.
Delivering the student report on behalf of her cohort at the 2025 Court Prosecutors Training Course, Paula Brewster pushed back against what she described as lingering negative perceptions of police prosecutors by members of the legal profession. She used the occasion to advocate for stronger investment in those who handle the majority of criminal matters before the court.
“In many Caribbean countries, some lawyers have a negative perception of police prosecutors, with comments like ‘You are not trained’, ‘I went to law school for five years’, and an all-time favourite, ‘I appeared before the CCJ and won’,” she said.
“These lawyers frequently forget that today’s police prosecutors may become tomorrow’s judges, as evidenced by your own Justice Watts and Justice Blackman.”
Brewster was speaking during the joint closing ceremony for the Prosecutors and Enhanced Constables Development Courses, which ended on Friday at the Regional Police Training Centre.
She stood alongside Delando Charles of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Orlando Dasent of Montserrat, representing the 26 participants from jurisdictions that included Barbados, Grenada, Saint Lucia, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Montserrat, the British Virgin Islands, and Turks and Caicos Islands.
She said the course reignited a passion for prosecution and deepened participants’ understanding of their role, not as mere representatives of the state, but as ministers of justice committed to fairness and professionalism.
“We are prosecutors, not persecutors. The overarching goal is not to get a conviction but to see justice prevail for all,” Brewster told the gathering.
“We learnt not just how to build a case, but how to present it with clarity, confidence, and integrity.”
She described the five-week course as demanding but transformative, covering trial advocacy, legal ethics, case analysis, public speaking, and victim care.
(From left) Acting ACP Barry Hunte presents Brewster with her certificate of completion.
Participants also took part in moot court trials that Brewster said fostered both collaboration and critical thinking.
The experience, she said, brought together prosecutors from various disciplines and departments, including policing, immigration, labour, and planning, and created lasting connections across the region.
“We debated, collaborated, and supported one another, especially during the moot court sessions where the spirit of teamwork was palpable,” she added.
The Barbadian prosecutor also used the platform to call for specific changes at the policy and institutional level, including the physical integration of police prosecutors into offices of the Director of Public Prosecutions.
“We encourage all Caribbean leaders, ministers of justice, and commissioners of police to collaborate to physically integrate police prosecutors into your DPP’s office, where trained lawyers can provide daily case file analysis and guidance,” she said.
“Prosecutors should also have access to primary and secondary legal resources to improve [their] respective national prosecution services, as has been done in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.”
Brewster said if regional leaders are serious about improving justice systems, they must not only offer continued training but also make available grants, bursaries, and scholarships for police prosecutors to further their studies.
“There is no doubt that summary matters account for more than 80 per cent of cases brought before the court. As a result, we are advocating not just for increased support through regional and worldwide training but also for grants, bursaries, and scholarships to be made available exclusively for police prosecutors,” she said.
She issued a call to her fellow graduates to stay committed to learning and justice, quoting futurist Alvin Toffler: “The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.”
“As we leave these walls of the Regional Police Training Centre, we will continue to learn, unlearn, and relearn, which will help to shape us in our quest for fairness, because justice demands nothing less.” (SM)
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