Geisha Kow­lessar

In­ves­ti­ga­tors prob­ing the al­leged plot to as­sas­si­nate Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and three of her cab­i­net col­leagues have re­vealed there was a well-or­ches­trat­ed plan to cre­ate a ma­jor dis­trac­tion in the coun­try and im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter, kill Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and the three Cab­i­net mem­bers.A se­nior le­gal source, as­signed to the State, and work­ing in tan­dem with law en­force­ment en­ti­ties, said so yes­ter­day, un­der strict anonymi­ty.

Ac­cord­ing to the source, the dis­trac­tion would have been so huge that it would have di­vert­ed the at­ten­tion of the po­lice and mil­i­tary."And while that was hap­pen­ing-per­haps it would have been loot­ing-the tak­ing over of tele­vi­sion sta­tions or some­thing of that ex­treme and large na­ture to dis­tract the armed forces, then the as­sas­si­na­tion would take place," the source said.

"That was what we have been in­formed of by in­tel­li­gence of­fi­cers. "The of­fi­cers, how­ev­er, could not pro­vide suf­fi­cient in­for­ma­tion to de­ter­mine if the two plans were linked." He said that was the rea­son be­hind the par­tic­u­lar word­ing of the de­ten­tion or­der, nam­ing some de­tainees as be­ing in­volved in a con­spir­a­cy to as­sas­si­nate, while oth­ers were iden­ti­fied as the peo­ple be­hind a plot to desta­bilise Trinidad and To­ba­go and cause ma­jor pan­ic.

He said, how­ev­er, that up to the time the de­ten­tion or­ders were be­ing draft­ed, there was no con­crete ev­i­dence to def­i­nite­ly link the two plots as all part of "one ma­jor plot" which would have worked in tan­dem with each oth­er, hence the rea­son for two sep­a­rate and dis­tinct de­ten­tion or­ders be­ing draft­ed and served.The de­tainees, he added, were be­ing held "mere­ly on sus­pi­cion," hence the rea­son no charges had yet been laid.

"Charges de­pend on re­al ev­i­dence...At present the de­tainees are be­ing held on sus­pi­cion, pend­ing fur­ther in­ves­ti­ga­tion," the source said."And if fur­ther in­ves­ti­ga­tion re­veals there is enough ev­i­dence gath­ered to charge, then charges will be laid."Ques­tioned on what was the na­ture of the charges, he said if there was suf­fi­cient ev­i­dence, the de­tainees could like­ly be charged un­der the com­mon law.

He iden­ti­fied con­spir­a­cy to mur­der and con­spir­a­cy to cause pub­lic dis­or­der as two of the charges which could be laid.But with four more days to go be­fore the state of emer­gency ex­pires on De­cem­ber 5, and with the fate of 16 de­tainees pre­car­i­ous­ly hang­ing in the bal­ance, the State has al­so ex­pressed con­cern that in­ves­ti­ga­tors were now left with on­ly a win­dow of op­por­tu­ni­ty to put for­ward a con­crete case.

"Time is run­ning out and the po­lice have some very tough de­ci­sions to make," the source said.And lawyers rep­re­sent­ing the de­tainees have al­so de­mand­ed why their clients were be­ing held and what charges were ex­pect­ed to be laid, if any.The lawyers have al­so filed doc­u­ments which have been re­ceived by the Spe­cial Tri­bunal Com­mit­tee.Up to late yes­ter­day, tri­bunal mem­bers were pe­rus­ing the doc­u­ments.

The tri­bunal's chair­man, Se­nior Coun­sel Gilbert Pe­ter­son, said yes­ter­day that the com­mit­tee was not yet ready to pro­ceed.A source close to the tri­bunal, how­ev­er, said the tri­bunal could start hear­ings as ear­ly as to­mor­row and could sit over the week­end.Faris Al Rawi, who is rep­re­sent­ing Ash­meed Chote, said yes­ter­day that there was "a talk" that charges could be laid un­der the An­ti-Ter­ror­ism Act, but added that he could not con­firm whether this was true or not.

"Up to now we have no idea why our client is be­ing de­tained or what are the charges ex­pect­ed to be laid against him," he said.He al­so called on the Gov­ern­ment to clar­i­fy par­tic­u­lars in the de­ten­tion or­der which made spe­cif­ic ref­er­ence to the word­ing, "A plot to desta­bilise T&T and cause ma­jor pan­ic."