An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

Hours be­fore the end of the 105-day State of Emer­gency (SoE) yes­ter­day, 39 de­tainees were re­leased from the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison (MSP) at Gold­en Grove and the East­ern Cor­rec­tion­al and Re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion Cen­tre (ECRC) in San­ta Rosa.

How­ev­er, 11 per­sons de­tained un­der the spe­cial reg­u­la­tions re­main in cus­tody as they are now fac­ing crim­i­nal charges.

Re­vo­ca­tion or­ders for the re­lease of the 39 de­tainees were signed by Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les yes­ter­day morn­ing, one day af­ter re­lease or­ders were for the 11 who are to be charged, al­low­ing po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tors to take them back in­to cus­tody from the prison au­thor­i­ties.

In ad­di­tion, three of their as­so­ciates will al­so be charged, bring­ing the num­ber of per­sons fac­ing crim­i­nal charges, to 14.

Dur­ing the SoE, which be­gan on De­cem­ber 30, 50 peo­ple were held un­der pre­ven­tive de­ten­tion or­ders (PDO).

Yes­ter­day, six of them were re­leased from the ECRC be­tween 3.25 pm and 4.05 pm, while sev­en was re­leased from the MSP be­tween 3 pm and 3.30 pm.

They were greet­ed with big smiles and hugs from loved ones wait­ing for them in the car-park out­side the MSP. How­ev­er, there was much more re­straint at the ECRC where the de­tainees were in­struct­ed to get in­to wait­ing ve­hi­cles which then sped off.

Rel­a­tives of de­tainees held in the ECRC be­gan ar­riv­ing at the fa­cil­i­ty as ear­ly as 7 am ex­pect­ing their ear­ly re­lease. They were not al­lowed to park near the fa­cil­i­ty and were di­rect­ed on­ly to ap­proach when in­struct­ed to do so by a prison of­fi­cial.

They wait­ed mid­way along the ac­cess road lead­ing to the fa­cil­i­ty and the de­tainees were sent out clutch­ing plas­tic bags with their cloth­ing while their faces were cov­ered with tow­els.

Al­though the re­leas­es did not come un­til late yes­ter­day, there was a heavy po­lice pres­ence at both fa­cil­i­ties from ear­ly with uni­formed and plain-clothes of­fi­cers from spe­cial units con­duct­ing mo­bile and sta­t­ic pa­trols.

As the first de­tainee was be­ing re­leased from the ECRC, of­fi­cers searched the oc­cu­pants of two cars but noth­ing il­le­gal was found.

At the MSP, de­tainees were in­struct­ed to get in­to wait­ing ve­hi­cles and not linger.

All the per­sons held dur­ing the SoE were to be re­leased by mid­night ex­cept for those who were kept in po­lice cus­tody to face crim­i­nal charges.

Un­der the SoE reg­u­la­tions, po­lice of­fi­cers were giv­en ex­pand­ed pow­ers, in­clud­ing the au­thor­i­ty to search premis­es and in­di­vid­u­als with­out war­rants, if they had rea­son­able sus­pi­cion of crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty.

Pressed yes­ter­day to say what had led to the hours-long de­lay in the re­lease of the 39 de­tainees, se­nior law en­force­ment of­fi­cials ex­plained that it was lengthy be­cause of the num­ber of per­sons to be processed.

DCP: We will not tol­er­ate crim­i­nal­i­ty

In a brief state­ment fol­low­ing the re­lease of the de­tainees, Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice, In­tel­li­gence and In­ves­ti­ga­tions, Suzette Mar­tin, sent out a warn­ing to any­one want­i­ng to dis­rupt the peace that law en­force­ment would not con­done it.

Mar­tin said the ob­jec­tive of the SoE had been “to re­store or­der, en­sure pub­lic safe­ty, and pro­tect the rights and well-be­ing of every law-abid­ing cit­i­zen.”

She praised the ef­forts of per­son­nel from all arms of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) and the De­fence Force, as well as in­tel­li­gence and in­ves­tiga­tive units, which had led to 50 per­sons be­ing de­tained.

In ad­di­tion to the 11 fac­ing charges, Mar­tin said an ad­di­tion­al four per­sons would be charged with il­le­gal pos­ses­sion of firearms and am­mu­ni­tion, gang-re­lat­ed of­fences, at­tempt­ed mur­der and oth­er of­fences.

“These charges re­flect the con­tin­ued com­mit­ment of the TTPS to up­hold the law and send a clear mes­sage to those in­tent on dis­rupt­ing peace and sta­bil­i­ty — we will not tol­er­ate crim­i­nal­i­ty in any form,” she said.

“Let me be clear: the de­c­la­ra­tion of a State of Emer­gency was not tak­en light­ly. It is a tool used to ad­dress ex­treme threats to pub­lic safe­ty. The ar­rests and sub­se­quent charges demon­strate the ef­fec­tive­ness of our op­er­a­tions and the se­ri­ous­ness of the sit­u­a­tion we are fac­ing.”

All 15 ac­cused are ex­pect­ed to ap­pear in court to­day and in­ves­ti­ga­tions are con­tin­u­ing in­to mat­ters in­volv­ing some of the peo­ple who were re­leased.

“We an­tic­i­pate that ad­di­tion­al ar­rests and charges will be made as our in­tel­li­gence and ev­i­dence gath­er­ing con­tin­ues,” Mar­tin said.

Fo­cus­ing on the ef­forts and com­mit­ment demon­strat­ed by law en­force­ment per­son­nel dur­ing the SoE, she added: “I want to take this op­por­tu­ni­ty to com­mend the hard-work­ing of­fi­cers who have been op­er­at­ing around the clock un­der chal­leng­ing con­di­tions. Their pro­fes­sion­al­ism and courage de­serve the high­est praise.”

Mar­tin al­so ex­pressed grat­i­tude to the pub­lic and urged:“Your sup­port and co­op­er­a­tion are vi­tal. We urge you to con­tin­ue to re­port sus­pi­cious ac­tiv­i­ties and abide by the laws of the Trinidad and To­ba­go. To­geth­er, we will over­come this chal­leng­ing pe­ri­od and mak­ing every place in Trinidad and To­ba­go safe.”