Gbarnga, Bong County – The Resident Circuit Judge of the Ninth Judicial Circuit Court in Gbarnga, his Honor J. Boima Kontoe, has instructed the Cleck of Court to, with immediate effect, issue a writ of Summons to Thirty-three legal practitioners who failed to attend the opening of February 2025 A.D Term of Court without prior notice.
Judge Kontoe, in the discharge of his judicial orders Monday, during the official opening of the February Term in Gbarnga, referenced rule three of the Supreme Court as legal grounds for his actions.
According to him, rule three of the Honorable Supreme Court mandates all assigned judicial actors to at all times attend all opening sessions of their assigned courts and answer to the roll call of their names during said ceremony.
Additionally, Judge Kontoe further stated that failure on the part of any legal actors to adhere to the high court’s mandate, such individuals are subject to punishment for their actions.
He noted that rule three of the high court mandates that absentees pay a fine of not less than twenty-five United States Dollars and not more than one hundred United States Dollars.
The Ninth Judicial Circuit Judge added that said absentees are also mandated to appear before the circuit judge following a request to provide justifications for her failure to comply with the law.
However, judge Kontoe has mandated the check of the court to order the appearance of those judicial absentees to appear before his Honor not later than Monday, February 18, 2025, to justify the reason for their absence from the court’s opening.
At the same time, four graduates of the Louis Arthur Grimes School of Law at the University of Liberia have been admitted into the Bong County Bar Association.
The newly inducted attorneys-at-law include Atty. Richard M. Dafuwah, Samuel K. Goteh, Leemue Minnie James, and Henry B. Sackie.
The court had earlier announced the names of five new graduates of the law school to be admitted into the local, but one of them, suspended NOCAL boss Rustonlyn Suakoko Dinnes, didn’t attend the ceremony.
However, performing the induction ceremony ritual, Judge Kontoe charged the newly inducted legal practitioners to execute their professional duties void of interest or public sentiment.
He encouraged them to always exhibit fairness and transparency in the dispensation of their jurisdiction in all cases they will engage to properly dispense justice.
In response, Leemue Minnie James, who spoke on behalf of her colleagues, pledged their commitment to upholding the rule of law in the discharge of their judicial duties.
