The Supreme Court has awarded a sum of Vt 500,000 to Parmod Achary as damages for trespass and conversion in relation to an unlawful warrant obtained and executed by the Ombudsman in 2019.

Trespass and conversion were the only grounds that Justice Viran Trief ruled in favour of the former Vanuatu National Provident Fund (VNPF) General Manager although his initial claim was Vt 5 million.

Other claims by Mr Achary were denied by the Supreme Court including “entitlement to exemplary damages”, “entitlement to VT8,000,000 damages for unlawful and unwarranted prosecution and legal costs of VT400,000”, and entitlement to “VT5,700,000 damages for intensified medical pain and suffering, and medical costs”.

The unlawful search warrant was obtained from the Magistrates in 2019 but subsequently in 2023 the Magistrates’ Court issued a Minute stating that it had not had jurisdiction to issue that search warrant and dismissing the charges which had been laid subsequent to that search.

According to the Supreme Court written judgment, “The execution on 26 August 2019 of the unlawful search warrant issued by the Magistrates’ Court gave right to Mr Achary’s claims for damages for trespass and conversion.

“First, the search warrant was unlawful in that the application for it was made to the wrong Court.

“Section 1 of the Ombudsman Act defines clearly that “Court’ referred to in s. 24 of the Act means, “the Supreme Court.”

“Secondly, the search warrant was unlawful because there was no prior notice served on Mr Achary pursuant to s. 22 of the Act.

“As the General Manager of the VNPF, Mr Achary was a leader. He should have been served with a written notice: Ombudsman of the Republic of Vanuatu v Letlet [2023] VUCA 1 at [7]-[23] and August v Ombudsman of the Republic of Vanuatu [2021] VUCA 59.

“The obvious effect is that the search warrant was not authorized by law and therefore it was void from the beginning. Consequently, all the actions that followed or were done by the agents of the Ombudsman on 26 August 2019 at the VNPF premises were not lawfully authorized.

“All those actions amounted to trespass and conversion entitling Mr Achary to damages.

“The Ombudsman relies on the evidence of John Meake, Ronnie Boe and Jackson Lessa to show that the execution of the search warrant was done in a proper fashion.

“Even if it was, with the warrant being unlawful from the beginning there was no authority to be at the VNPF premises on 26 August 2019 and conducting a search and seizing documents and other materials.

“All those actions amounted to trespass and conversion by the Ombudsman’s agents.

“The Ombudsman has therefore correctly conceded liability in the present matter.

“It is accepted that on 22 March 2020, the Ombudsman returned to Mr Achary all the documents seized from the VNPF premises.”

The initial total claim by Achary against the Ombudsman amounts Vt 19.1 million but he was awarded on Vt 500,000.

Justice Trief noted in her judgment that the matter is listed for Conference on 8 December where the Ombudsman is expected to inform the court if the Vt 500,000 has been paid or or how it intends to do so.

Parmod is a Fijian National who quits his role as VNPF General Manager in 2023 after he was found guilty of 5 counts of indecency without consent and five counts of breach of the Leadership Code Act.