A drug trafficking investigation that culminated in two Police raids on the offices of lawyer Mr. Julian Hall last year was allowed to proceed yesterday after the Court of Appeal refused the lawyer's attempt to bring the matter before the Privy Council.

The investigation, which Police said yesterday will resume, had been put on hold when Mr. Hall challenged the legality of the raids.

But while he enjoyed some initial success, a Supreme Court decision that said the Magistrate who issued the original search warrants had failed to consider whether the documents to be seized in the raids were subject to lawyer-client privilege was subsequently overturned by the Court of Appeal.

Yesterday, the Court of Appeal cemented its decision by denying Mr.

Hall the leave to take his case to the Privy Council.

"We refuse leave,'' the Hon. Mr. Justice Huggins said. "It's always open to you to petition the Privy Council directly, but I'm afraid we must refuse.'' On hearing the judgment, Mr. Robin McMillan, Mr. Hall's lawyer in the matter, asked the three-judge panel if it would stay the release of the seized documents until his client had a chance to make the petition. The judges refused, saying: "The trouble is it will be two years before you get before the Privy Council. If you wait two years, go before the Council and lose, it will have been so far gone that the evidence will be of little use to the investigation.

"Even if we had the power, which is very doubtful, we're not prepared to grant a stay.'' The judges did not provide a reason for their decision.

Yesterday, Mr. Hall said he was not surprised by the panel's conclusion and had taken steps in anticipation of it.

"Work on the petition has already been done. We just didn't file the documents before now,'' he told The Royal Gazette , adding: "This was just a formality, although I do think we made the point that the seizures were wrong.'' Mr. Hall, who claimed that "some of the best Queen's counsels'' were working on his case, said his petition would likely be assessed by the Council in early 1995.

He also said that he was willing to take the matter to a higher level if he was unsuccessful at that stage.

"The Privy Council is not the end,'' he said. "After that, we still have the option of going before the European Court. And this is a case that will go the whole way.'' In the meantime, acting Police Commissioner Mr. Alex Forbes said through a spokesman yesterday that the investigation into suspected incidents of drug trafficking and money laundering would be picking up where it left off.

In October of 1993, two separate warrants to search Mr. Hall's Front Street offices were granted to the Police by a Magistrate who said he was satisfied there were reasonable grounds to suspect the lawyer had benefited from drug trafficking activities.

"The investigation will resume,'' the spokesman said yesterday. "It was held up by the legal challenges, but now it will resume.'' For his part, Mr. Hall remained confident that his case would eventually prevail.

Contrary to acting Attorney General Mr. Barrie Meade's assertion that the question of search warrants as they pertained to lawyer-client privilege was a matter for the legislature, Mr. Hall said the raids on his offices were a clear contravention of existing statutes.

"I personally think the law is very clear and very explicit and that the judges made a very serious mistake,'' he said, adding: "But I am not going to argue this case in the media.''