As Trinidad and To­ba­go con­tin­ues to live un­der a State of Emer­gency, one trou­bling is­sue re­mains large­ly un­ad­dressed. That is, the fate of dozens of in­di­vid­u­als de­tained un­der the sweep­ing pow­ers grant­ed to law en­force­ment.

Week af­ter week, the au­thor­i­ties have is­sued de­ten­tion or­ders against cit­i­zens, of­ten ac­com­pa­nied by de­tailed state­ments link­ing them to se­ri­ous crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty.

These an­nounce­ments were meant to re­as­sure the pub­lic that law en­force­ment was fi­nal­ly strik­ing at the heart of vi­o­lent crime.

Yet, as wel­come as that may be to law-abid­ing cit­i­zens, there have been no fol­low-up an­nounce­ments of charges be­ing laid, no pros­e­cu­tions an­nounced, and no court ap­pear­ances record­ed.

This rais­es se­ri­ous con­cerns about what will hap­pen to these al­leged of­fend­ers when the State of Emer­gency ex­pires.

As we all know, the State does not have the au­thor­i­ty to de­tain cit­i­zens in­def­i­nite­ly on the ba­sis of sus­pi­cion or in­tel­li­gence that nev­er trans­lates in­to ev­i­dence be­fore the courts.

If the po­lice and na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies tru­ly pos­sess cred­i­ble in­for­ma­tion on the al­leged crimes of these de­tainees, as out­lined in the de­ten­tion or­ders, that in­for­ma­tion should be strong enough to sup­port for­mal charges.

If not, it is fair to ask whether these de­ten­tions serve the cause of jus­tice or mere­ly the ap­pear­ance of de­ci­sive ac­tion.

Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro, as the coun­try’s chief law en­force­ment of­fi­cer, owes the pub­lic clear ac­count­ing.

How many de­ten­tion or­ders have been is­sued to date? How many have re­sult­ed in pros­e­cu­tions? Have in­ves­ti­ga­tions un­cov­ered the ev­i­dence nec­es­sary to move these cas­es from the realm of in­tel­li­gence to that of due process?

Trans­paren­cy in this re­gard is es­sen­tial if pub­lic con­fi­dence in the State of Emer­gency is to be main­tained. We have trav­elled this road be­fore.

The 2011 State of Emer­gency pro­duced hun­dreds of de­ten­tions and bold de­c­la­ra­tions that gang lead­ers and vi­o­lent of­fend­ers were off the streets. But when that SoE end­ed, most were qui­et­ly re­leased with­out charge, and the mur­der rate soon climbed high­er than be­fore.

The les­son from that pe­ri­od is that de­ten­tion with­out pros­e­cu­tion may tem­porar­i­ly sup­press crime but does not solve it. The au­thor­i­ties must not re­peat that mis­take.

If de­tainees are re­leased with­out ever fac­ing the courts when the cur­rent SoE ex­pires, it will con­firm that the State has wield­ed its ex­tra­or­di­nary pow­ers with­out se­cur­ing the sol­id, pros­e­cutable ev­i­dence that gen­uine crime-fight­ing de­mands.

Such an out­come would not on­ly weak­en the cred­i­bil­i­ty of the po­lice but al­so raise trou­bling ques­tions about civ­il lib­er­ties and the mis­use of emer­gency pow­ers.

Equal­ly trou­bling is the shift­ing ex­pla­na­tion for why the SoE was de­clared. Gov­ern­ment ini­tial­ly said it was to avert a cred­i­ble threat to as­sas­si­nate State of­fi­cials and desta­bilise the coun­try.

The Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice lat­er as­sured the na­tion that this threat had been elim­i­nat­ed.

Yet, the jus­ti­fi­ca­tion has since changed, as it is now said to be nec­es­sary to curb mur­ders and vi­o­lent crime.

If this SoE is to re­tain any le­git­i­ma­cy, it can­not rest on si­lence and shift­ing nar­ra­tives.

The pub­lic good is best served through clear an­swers, mea­sur­able out­comes, and jus­tice that does not end where de­ten­tion be­gins.