Osbourne Douglas and another (Appellants) v The Governor of the Cayman Islands and another (Respondents)

Case summary

Case ID

JCPC/2026/0064

Jurisdiction

Cayman Islands

Parties

Appellant(s)

Osbourne Douglas and Justin Ramoon

Respondent(s)

(1) The Governor of the Cayman Islands (2) The Director of the Prisons

Issue

Did the Court of Appeal err in its approach to the assessment of the appellants’ challenge to their transfers from HMP Northward on Grand Cayman to English high security prisons and, in particular, should the Court of Appeal have undertaken a fresh proportionality assessment? Did the transfers breach the appellants’ rights under the Bill of Rights?

Facts

The appellants are serving life sentences for murder. They are said to be influential figures of a notorious Cayman gang called the “Central Military Killers”. They were initially detained under maximum security at HMP Northward on Grand Cayman, but in June 2017 were transferred to high security prisons in England where they have been since. The decisions to remove them (the “Decisions”) followed an urgent request by the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service to the Cayman Government on 27 April 2017. According to the Government, the reasons for the removal included that intelligence showed the appellants had continued to engage in organised criminal activity while detained, that HMP Northward was insufficiently secure, and that their activities would continue to present a serious and tangible threat to public safety. The appellants commenced applications for judicial review of the Decisions in September 2017. There were subsequently a series of rulings relating to the availability of the closed material procedure (“CMP”) in the Cayman Islands. In March 2023 the JCPC finally ruled that there was no CMP available in the Cayman Islands and remitted the judicial review to the Grand Court ([2023] UKPC 9). The Grand Court dismissed the judicial review in a judgment delivered on 24 October 2024. The Court of Appeal dismissed the appellants’ appeal on 1 May 2026. The appellants now appeal to the Privy Council as of right.

Date of issue

20 July 2026

Case origin

Appeal As of Right

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