On Monday, King’s attorney, Norward Rolle, moved that the application for King’s committal to Her Majesty’s Prison be dismissed along with a summons to order King to repay the debt either immediately or in installments.
According to Mr. Rolle, the application for committal should not succeed because his client did not act in contempt of court, as alleged by attorney for American Express, Peter Maynard.
Refuting the argument that Mr. King should be held in contempt for failing to make a number of court appearances, Mr. Rolle said his client did in fact appear in court as last ordered on June 5, 2002.
Mr. Rolle further pointed out that the June 5 hearing was adjourned to September 24, 2002, however, there is no court record to indicate what happened on that date.
Stating that “it would be novel for committal proceedings to commence for failure to attend court on a summons,” Mr. Rolle said the March 21, 2002 order to appear in court on June 5 was the only such order made and all subsequent instructions to appear were only summonses.
According to the attorney, in addition to not being ordered to appear in court after June 5, 2002 – King was never ordered to pay American Express the $417,912.02 being sought by the company.
Noting that such an order cannot be issued until the court determines that King has the means to pay the debt, Mr. Rolle said although American Express was awarded a judgement against King, the defendant was never ordered to pay that amount.
Rejecting claims that recent photographs of King with American author and entrepreneur Stedman Graham and other celebrities are proof of King’s ability to pay the amount owed, Mr. Rolle questioned on what basis could such claims be taken as evidence of his client’s financial standing.
Representing the plaintiff and judgement creditor – American Express, Mr. Maynard said the defendant stated previously that his annual income was approximately $120,000 per annum, however, following the September 11 terror attacks in the United States his income was reduced to about $60,000.
Mr. Maynard said if Mr. King was experiencing difficulty in making the credit card payments based upon his income, he could have informed the court and requested an alternative arrangement for repayment, however, this was never done.
According to Mr. Maynard, Mr. King also attempted to defraud American Express by sending cheques to the company while sufficient funds were on his account, but withdrawing the money before the cheques cleared.
After listening to arguments by both attorneys, Justice Longley said he would reserve judgement in the matter, retiring from the courtroom to consider a decision.
Darrin Culmer, The Bahama Journal
