Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

The T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) is in­ves­ti­gat­ing the dis­ap­pear­ance of ap­prox­i­mate­ly $90,000 in cash from the San Fer­nan­do City Cor­po­ra­tion’s of­fice on Pen­i­tence Street.

The mon­ey, which rep­re­sent­ed fees and tax­es col­lect­ed be­tween April 30 and May 16, was dis­cov­ered miss­ing by an em­ploy­ee on Mon­day.

Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands that around 3.15 pm on May 16, an em­ploy­ee of the cor­po­ra­tion se­cured $6,534.50 in a four-draw­er fire­proof cab­i­net. The cab­i­net, how­ev­er, al­ready con­tained $83,465.50. The mon­ey was in sealed bank en­velopes.

The cab­i­net, lo­cat­ed in an of­fice on the west­ern side of the build­ing, was then locked.

How­ev­er, when the em­ploy­ee re­turned around 3.15 pm on Mon­day and opened the cab­i­net with a key, the mon­ey was miss­ing.

The San Fer­nan­do CID was con­tact­ed and in­ves­ti­ga­tors have since con­duct­ed in­ter­views with staff mem­bers. It was con­firmed that mul­ti­ple em­ploy­ees had ac­cess to both the cab­i­net and its key. Cor­po­ra­tion of­fi­cials told the po­lice no one was au­tho­rised to re­move the funds.

Con­tact­ed on this in­ci­dent yes­ter­day, San Fer­nan­do May­or Robert Par­ris yes­ter­day said it was an ad­min­is­tra­tive is­sue and had noth­ing to do with the po­lit­i­cal arm. How­ev­er, he said CEO Heather Craw­ford had writ­ten a re­port to the per­ma­nent sec­re­tary and CPO for ad­vice on how to pro­ceed.

The may­or said he has al­so re­quest­ed a meet­ing of the Fi­nance Com­mit­tee for the CEO to ex­plain to mem­bers of coun­cil what oc­curred.

At­tempts to con­tact Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Khadi­jah Ameen and the CEO were un­suc­cess­ful.

Ag Cpl Khan is in­ves­ti­gat­ing.