?Rose­marie Sant

Sev­er­al pris­ons of­fi­cers have cho­sen to make the pris­ons dor­mi­to­ry their homes for fear of los­ing their lives while liv­ing on the out­side. Pris­ons of­fi­cers said they have re­ceived death threats which they re­port­ed to the au­thor­i­ties, but no one has tak­en them se­ri­ous­ly.The of­fi­cers said it's as if they al­ways have to beg for at­ten­tion and pro­tec­tion.

The of­fi­cers, who spoke with the GML En­ter­prise Desk on con­di­tion of anonymi­ty, said they have no line of de­fence and they are grow­ing in­creas­ing­ly con­cerned about their wel­fare and the safe­ty of their fam­i­lies. As a re­sult, they have cho­sen to pro­tect them­selves by aban­don­ing their homes and mak­ing prison dor­mi­to­ries, which they de­scribe as "an open thor­ough­fare," their home.

To com­pound the sit­u­a­tion, the mar­riages of many of­fi­cers have fall­en apart as wives have aban­doned them and mi­grat­ed with their fam­i­lies due to fear.

While pres­i­dent of the Prison Of­fi­cers As­so­ci­a­tion Ceron Richards said that six or sev­en of­fi­cers have opt­ed to stay in the dor­mi­to­ries "based on se­ri­ous se­cu­ri­ty is­sues," pris­ons of­fi­cers on the ground claimed the num­ber to­tals around 30 and is grow­ing.Richards ex­plained that threats made against the of­fi­cers "have been brought to the at­ten­tion of the au­thor­i­ties, but for some rea­son or the oth­er, we don't get any at­ten­tion, we al­ways have to beg for help."

Richards said that every day of­fi­cers put their lives at risk to the detri­ment of their fam­i­lies.

"Many of the men their fam­i­lies have fall­en apart be­cause liv­ing with them is viewed as a li­a­bil­i­ty. Wives have left their hus­bands, fam­i­lies have mi­grat­ed, it is a re­al sad sit­u­a­tion and there is no sup­port from the State. But we be­lieve that now is the best time for the Gov­ern­ment to speak about of­fi­cers' safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty giv­en the debt that is owed to us."

Of­fi­cers said the dor­mi­to­ries where they live have few ameni­ties but are out­fit­ted with beds "for of­fi­cers to rest on in be­tween shifts." But even this, they said, is bet­ter "than risk­ing our lives on the out­side."

A spokesman at the of­fice of the Com­mis­sion­er of Pris­ons Ster­ling Stew­art said they have no in­for­ma­tion that the men have been liv­ing in the dor­mi­to­ries. Wen­dell Bom­parte told the GML En­ter­prise Desk that "the dor­mi­to­ries are not meant to be lived in be­cause then it af­fects the men who need to rest in be­tween shifts."

Bom­parte said, "It is not a board­ing place, liv­ing there is not al­lowed be­cause there is no area you can call your own 24/7. It is for batch­es, when an­oth­er batch comes that is some­body's space you're tak­ing up."

In ear­ly 2015, pris­ons of­fi­cers re­port­ed­ly dis­cov­ered a plan for paid hit men to kill sev­er­al of­fi­cers who were in­volved in jail cell search­es and raids. Even with this in­for­ma­tion in hand and a re­port made to their su­pe­ri­ors, noth­ing has been done to pro­tect them and their fam­i­lies.

One of­fi­cer, David Mil­lette, was shot dead in the dri­ve­way of his Sec­ond Cale­do­nia, Mor­vant, home in No­vem­ber, last year. Of­fi­cers al­so al­leged that "the close re­la­tion­ships which some in­mates have with their se­niors put our lives at risk." This, they said, made them feel un­safe and the sit­u­a­tion be­comes worse every time an of­fi­cer is at­tacked or los­es his life.

They said since the mur­der of pris­ons of­fi­cer Fitzal­bert Vic­tor in Feb­ru­ary, noth­ing has been done to en­sure their safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty or that of their fam­i­lies.Richards said the of­fi­cers want to do their jobs, but they need the Gov­ern­ment to "do what is nec­es­sary to pro­tect pris­ons of­fi­cers." He said they want a Law En­force­ment Safe­ty Act, a hous­ing pol­i­cy, and the re­moval of of­fi­cers from high-risk ar­eas.

Richards said the pris­ons of­fi­cers "put their lives at stake but the State con­tin­ues to fail them." He told the GML En­ter­prise Desk that they are meet­ing with Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert to­mor­row (Tues­day), and they in­tend to raise with him the "is­sue of hous­es or land for pris­ons of­fi­cers."

"We do not want bonds, we pre­fer they set­tle the debt owed to prison of­fi­cers by giv­ing us what we re­al­ly need–HDC hous­ing or off­set the debt owed to us by giv­ing us gov­ern­ment land, that will be more mean­ing­ful.

"Right now many of us are rent­ing be­cause we can­not af­ford the mort­gage on the open mar­ket, and be­cause of our salaries we can­not ac­cess the gov­ern­ment two per cent sub­sidy on hous­ing loans. Rent­ing is not the best op­tion. Give of­fi­cers hous­es or land so that they can man­age their se­cu­ri­ty," he said.

For­mer na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty min­is­ter Gary Grif­fith told the GML En­ter­prise Desk that when he was min­is­ter he got a list from the Po­lice, Prison and Army of of­fi­cers whose lives were un­der threat.

Grif­fith said he rec­om­mend­ed to the then Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil that the of­fi­cers be al­lo­cat­ed HDC homes un­der the ten per cent pro­vi­sion which is made for mem­bers of the pro­tec­tive ser­vices.

But he said his rec­om­men­da­tion was turned down by the coun­cil be­cause "cer­tain peo­ple felt that the ten per cent al­lo­ca­tion was for MPs to use at their dis­cre­tion."

Grif­fith said the is­sue of hous­ing for of­fi­cers was al­so crit­i­cal to their safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty.

Siezed con­tra­ban­dreturned to in­mates

Pris­ons of­fi­cers work for salaries rang­ing be­tween $6,000 and up­wards of $13,000 de­pend­ing on their lev­el. A pris­ons of­fi­cer one or PO1 earns $6,000 to $8,000 a month; a PO2 earns $8,000 to $12,000; and a prison su­per­in­ten­dent earns be­tween $12,000 and just un­der $14,000.

Pris­ons of­fi­cers said their salaries can­not com­pen­sate them for the risk which they face dai­ly. They said they of­ten con­duct search­es on in­mates and seize con­tra­band, yet they said they are "in­struct­ed'' to re­turn the con­tra­band un­der the pre­text that it will "save of­fi­cers' lives" and al­so "as­sist in in­tel­li­gence gath­er­ing."

The of­fi­cers said un­der the for­mer Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship gov­ern­ment "grab­bers, jam­mers and bul­let­proof vests were or­dered for all of­fi­cers, yet to this day the vests are yet to be dis­trib­uted."

We are told that the "jam­mers were on­ly re­cent­ly in­stalled and put in­to op­er­a­tion in Port-of-Spain, whilst in the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison jam­mers have been op­er­a­tional since 2015, but are on­ly on dur­ing the day." The of­fi­cers claimed that it was be­cause Se­nior Su­per­in­ten­dent of Pris­ons David Mil­lette or­dered that the jam­mers be put on in the night that he was mur­dered. They claimed that af­ter Mil­lette's mur­der ne­go­ti­a­tions took place with the high-pro­file in­mates and their se­niors "to turn the jam­mers off af­ter 8 pm."

Pris­ons of­fi­cers are al­so al­leg­ing that sev­er­al se­nior of­fi­cers had in­for­ma­tion about the im­pend­ing jail break last Ju­ly; the of­fi­cers al­so say that those who are charged with pro­tect­ing them (their se­niors) are al­so aware that there is a hit list with sev­er­al pris­ons of­fi­cers named.

They com­plain that "cer­tain in­mates are 'shot callers', so they are giv­en and af­ford­ed lux­u­ries that the av­er­age pris­on­er does not get."

Ac­cord­ing to them, one such pris­on­er (name called) has a "TV and a DVD out­side his cell at the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison." They al­so said lap­tops and portable DVD play­ers are grant­ed to pris­on­ers by a se­nior of­fi­cer, whom they iden­ti­fied, "for so-called ed­u­ca­tion­al use."

They ad­mit that a "22-inch TV was found in the re­mand sec­tion of the Port-of-Spain Prison D2 Di­vi­sion cell 14 along with an iPad, a PS4, a fan, blender, tablet, court and process hand­cuffs, and oth­er con­tra­band items."

That cell, they said, is oc­cu­pied by re­mand pris­on­er (name called) aka "Ten Cents," who is on a mur­der charge. The man is said to be the leader of a well-known gang.Those who as­sist the pris­on­ers, they said, are linked to some high-pro­file in­mates and once they do what is asked of them, "they are giv­en cut­backs."

The of­fi­cers are claim­ing that cre­ative ways are found to bring arms and am­mu­ni­tion in­to the prison. They said, last year, there was a func­tion at the prison and "guns and grenades were brought in the mu­sic box­es. They were re­moved while the mu­sic was be­ing set up."

Dur­ing "Op­er­a­tion Clean Sweep," ear­li­er this year, which was led by gov­ern­ment min­is­ters, the of­fi­cers said three guns, a si­lencer and six ex­tend­ed mag­a­zines were found, and short­ly af­ter that op­er­a­tion pris­ons of­fi­cers in a rou­tine check found more than 30 cell phones.

The of­fi­cers ex­plain that in­mates have tak­en to "hid­ing their con­tra­band goods in the roof, they re­move the ceil­ing and hide things in there."

Dil­lon:Pro­tec­tion of se­cu­ri­ty­se­cu­ri­ty forces a pri­or­i­ty

Asked about re­ports that sev­er­al pris­ons of­fi­cers have tak­en to liv­ing in prison dor­mi­to­ries for their own safe­ty and pro­tec­tion, Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Ed­mund Dil­lon said the se­cu­ri­ty of the na­tion's se­cu­ri­ty forces was a pri­or­i­ty for the Gov­ern­ment. He said, "We are go­ing to en­sure the pro­tec­tion of all ser­vice­men as they con­tin­ue to do their jobs safe­ly and se­cure­ly."

He did not want to go in­to de­tails on what ac­tion is be­ing pur­sued to en­sure the se­cu­ri­ty of not just the pris­ons of­fi­cers but oth­er arms of the na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty forces whose lives may be un­der threat be­cause of their jobs, but he told us, "Gov­ern­ment and the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty would do what is re­quired to pro­tect the lives of those who give their lives in ser­vice for the coun­try."

PRIS­ONS OF­FI­CERS MUR­DERED SINCE 2001:

2001 De­cem­ber 12–32-year-old Atwell Sandy shot and killed in Cas­cade

2003 May 4–49-year-old Win­ston Sandy shot dead in Laven­tille

2005 March 17– 49-year-old Anselm Paul shot dead in Laven­tille

2008 June 18–31-year-old An­im Joseph shot dead in St Joseph

2009 No­vem­ber 7–35-year-old Ian See­gob­in shot and killed in Arou­ca

2010 Jan­u­ary 23–32-year-old Nata­ki Hal­loway stran­gled in Gas­par­il­lo

2010 March 28–36-year-old Bernard Kirk Thomas shot dead in To­co

2010 June 10–53-year-old Er­ic Sim­mons shot dead in Laven­tille

2010 Ju­ly 6–35-year-old Mar­vin Di­az shot dead in Gas­par­il­lo

2010 Au­gust 21-21-year-old Reynold Par­ris shot in Mal­abar, died at EWM­SC

2013 No­vem­ber 7–42-year-old Andy Rogers shot dead in Ari­ma

2014 June 15–37-year-old Do­minic Bernard stabbed to death in Pointe-a-Pierre

2015 Ju­ly 17–27-year-old An­dell Primus shot and killed in Mor­vant

2015 No­vem­ber 2–50-year-old Su­per­in­ten­dent of Pris­ons David Mil­lette shot and killed in Mor­vant

2016 Feb­ru­ary 29–32-year-old Fitzal­bert Vic­tor shot out­side his Priz­gar Lands, Laven­tille, home. He died at the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal

The Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­istry has set up an of­fi­cial page pay­ing trib­ute to the fall­en of­fi­cers in­di­cat­ing that all of the of­fi­cers mur­dered over the years were "tar­get­ed as a con­se­quence of of­fi­cial du­ties."