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Monday, June 16, 2025

Abuse victim’s mom hopes others will benefit from Court ruling

by

Derek Achong
395 days ago
20240517
Samantha Isaacs

Samantha Isaacs

The moth­er of a mur­dered do­mes­tic vi­o­lence vic­tim, who suc­cess­ful­ly sued the State for fail­ing to pro­tect her daugh­ter from her abu­sive ex-boyfriend, has ex­pressed hope that oth­er vic­tims will ben­e­fit from her le­gal vic­to­ry.

In a brief tele­phone in­ter­view, yes­ter­day af­ter­noon, Tot Lamp­kin said, “I wish it could help oth­er women be­cause I know oth­er peo­ple who were in mine and my daugh­ter’s po­si­tion and are cry­ing out for help but they are not get­ting any help.”

She said she was elat­ed by the out­come, es­pe­cial­ly for her ten-year-old grand­son, whom she has raised since her daugh­ter Saman­tha Isaacs’ mur­der in late 2017.

“I am feel­ing good that jus­tice has been served. This would not bring back my daugh­ter but at least it will give peace of mind and pave a bet­ter way for her son,” she said.

Lamp­kin said she was pleased to take care of her grand­son, whom she de­scribed as a “car­bon copy” of her daugh­ter.

“Well, af­ter my daugh­ter passed, rais­ing her son was a plea­sure. It has not been a day that I don’t cry be­cause I al­ways think of my daugh­ter,” she said.

De­scrib­ing him as “well dis­ci­plined and be­haved”, she said, “You know what he is, my tow­er of strength. He is al­ways there to cheer me up. He is to­tal­ly blessed.”

Lamp­kin said the case was not an in­dict­ment against the en­tire T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS).

“I am not say­ing all po­lice are bad but there are some that don’t give you jus­tice,” she said.

Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, for­mer Coali­tion Against Do­mes­tic Vi­o­lence pres­i­dent Rober­ta Clarke, whom Lamp­kin thanked for be­ing in­stru­men­tal in her pur­su­ing the case, said the judg­ment would serve as an im­por­tant le­gal prece­dent.

“It out­lines for the first time the le­gal re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of the State to act ef­fec­tive­ly to pro­tect vic­tims. This in­cludes, I would say, time­ly con­sid­er­a­tion of ap­pli­ca­tions for pro­tec­tion or­ders, en­force­ment of or­ders and proac­tive polic­ing,” she said.

A le­gal source said At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Regi­nald Ar­mour would have to con­sid­er whether the judg­ment should be ap­pealed, as it may lead to an avalanche of cas­es from oth­er do­mes­tic vi­o­lence vic­tims who faced sim­i­lar cir­cum­stances as Lamp­kin and her daugh­ter.


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