A hearing, presided over by Commissioner Sir William Bailhache, deemed the St John politician ‘not fit for office’ and an election to find his replacement is now due to take place.
The judgment stems from the conviction of Mr Taylor for the offence of dangerous driving in August last year after he drove his car at an off-duty police officer manning a road closure on Rue Bechet ès Cats in Trinity in 2019. He was fined £4,000 and banned from driving for 18 months.
The Constable subsequently used parish money to pay his legal fees claiming he was carrying out parish duties at the time of the offence and the parish insurance would cover the costs.
However, following a public backlash he agreed to return the money. An investigation led by the Attorney General was then launched.
In a judgment, the Royal Court found Mr Taylor was wrong to claim parish funds until it was clear the insurance would cover his fees. They have ordered him to resign. He will remain as Constable until his replacement is elected.
‘There is a special obligation of trust in these situations and the appearance of what is done is sometimes nearly as important as the fact of what is done. In the present case, the Connétable was sure that he was acting on parish business and, thus, that the parish’s insurance cover would be available to him for his defence,’ the judgment said.
‘However, he ought to have realised that that was not a given and that if there were any problem in that respect, the parish would be at risk of paying out ratepayers’ money on his personal defence to criminal proceedings. There was certainly room for the insurers to have legitimately taken a different view.
‘In fact, there was argument with the insurers, which the Connétable handled himself, ultimately prevailing in his view that the cover was available. But at the time the first bill was received, addressed to the Connétable personally at his home address, and not to the parish, it was certainly not clear that the bill would be reimbursed by insurers in full or indeed at all. Nonetheless, he invited the Procureurs to pay it.’
The role of the Procureurs, a parish’s legal and financial representatives, was also examined and it was found that both officials – Stephen Hewlett and Michel Larose – should have questioned Mr Taylor on whether it was right to ask the insurers to cover his defence costs.
It was also deemed that the Procureurs were wrong to not have obtained a written undertaking from the Constable that he would cover any shortfall in the insurers’ contribution to his defence costs.
The judgment added: ‘Having the undertaking in writing would have obviated any difficulty in formulating the note to the accounts, and removed the question mark in the mind of the Second Respondent [Mr Hewlett] as to whether the payment of those fees by the parish had been “strictly legal”.’
It was also found that in some respects both Procureurs had fallen short of their oaths of office, although it was stressed that the court’s comments were made ‘as words of advice rather than any admonition or reprimand.’
Jurats Charles Blampied, Jeremy Ramsden and Jane Ronge were also sitting.
Full story: See tomorrow’s JEP.
