Legal team for Prince Smith mulls long-term strategy
DENISE Smith, attorney-at-law representing Prince Smith (no relation) in the matter of the possession of acreage farmed in the Blue Mountains, and which is also being claimed by a coffee trader, disclosed on January 3, 2022 that she will be looking strategically on the approach to the case which could get more challenging as time goes by.
A judgment in the matter is due this January, following a hearing in the parish court on December 8, 2021.
Prince Smith, a Blue Mountain coffee farmer, launched a Gofundme appeal to legally pursue claim for the land which he farms. He explains that his forebears have lived on Moy Hall since the time of slavery and his mother bears the name of the first landowner.
Courtney Fletcher, land surveyor and principal in Nakashka Coffee Company Limited, has taken Smith, the coffee farmer on the Moy Hall property in Yallahs, St Thomas, to court as trespasser on land for which he possesses a title.
The Jamaica Observer understands that the case will serve as a test for other farmers in the locale, as many are also operating on leases received decades ago, but on lands which fall within the acreage now being claimed by Fletcher under title.
Denise Smith noted, “The farmers on the property are in possession of leases...most of them... first from the Blue Mountain Coffee Growers society and the Wallenford
Coffee company.”
From other sources, the Sunday Finance has learnt that long-standing owners of the Moy Hall property, some resident abroad, are also following the legal matter.
Smith, who has been embroiled in court over the matter for half a decade, told the Sunday Finance that he is going to court to defend his stake of ten acres which he says has been passed down to his family from the time of slavery. The case came up before the parish court in Yallahs, St Thomas, on December 8.
Smith claims to be a descendant of the first owner of Standing Spring Coffee Plantation, known as the Moy Hall Estate, which was established in the 1790s by William Mccooty.
However, Fletcher’s wife told the Sunday Finance that he was in possession of a title and had bought the land. Fletcher previously indicated that he purchased acreage from JMMB as part of a bad debt portfolio, arising from a loan taken by a farmers’ cooperative which operated on the property.
Smith, the attorney-at-law representing Prince Smith, indicates that the Jamaica Agricultural Society...went into an agreement with the owners, promising to pay land taxes and put coffee growers on the property. Prince Smith in turn said that he received a lease agreement in 2005.
The farm in Ness Castle, in the Cedar Valley region of western St Thomas, Jamaica, has approximately 875 coffee trees on each acre, representing decades of cultivation, the farmer said.