Decision on infants’ coronial hearing adjourned

By Deidre Tautua – Fanene 25 October 2018, 12:00AM

The District Court has again adjourned its decision on whether a coronial hearing into the deaths of two babies in Savai’i should proceed.

The matter was listed in the Court diary and scheduled to be called yesterday morning. 

But the Court registrar advised lawyers representing the families of the deceased infants that the matter before Judge Fepuleai Ameperosa Roma is now adjourned to November 7.

Judge Fepuleai has to decide whether the coronial hearing into the deaths of the infants in July this year, after they were vaccinated, has to be put adjourned until the criminal proceedings against two nurses in the Supreme Court is completed. The two nurses are at the center of allegations that they administrated the vaccines before the two infants died. 

Last month senior sergeant Richard Ah Chong, who represented the prosecution at the time, made an application to the Court for the inquest hearing to be called together with the two nurses’ criminal proceedings. 

But counsel representing the deceased infants’ families, Muriel Lui, argued that the criminal matter should not be dependent on the inquest, and that the parents of the deceased had an interest in the handling of the matter early. The matter returns to the Court on November 7.

By Deidre Tautua – Fanene 25 October 2018, 12:00AM

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