Akash Sama­roo

Lead Ed­i­tor-Pol­i­tics

akash.sama­roo@cnc3.co.tt

Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der says po­lice re­cruits are now re­quired to un­der­go poly­graph ex­am­i­na­tions, psy­cho­log­i­cal as­sess­ments, drug test­ing and en­hanced back­ground checks as part of ef­forts to pre­vent un­suit­able can­di­dates from en­ter­ing the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS).

The dis­clo­sure comes amid re­newed scruti­ny of po­lice in­tegri­ty fol­low­ing a High Court rul­ing that found ev­i­dence of col­lu­sion among of­fi­cers in a case in­volv­ing fab­ri­cat­ed mar­i­jua­na charges against a Rio Claro fam­i­ly.

Alexan­der re­vealed the mea­sures in the Sen­ate yes­ter­day, while re­spond­ing to ques­tions from In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor Dr Mar­lene Attzs on the screen­ing of po­lice re­cruits and the sys­tems in place to iden­ti­fy mis­con­duct among serv­ing of­fi­cers.

The is­sue al­so comes ahead of the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the Spe­cial Op­er­a­tions leg­is­la­tion, which will grant po­lice ex­pand­ed pow­ers with­in des­ig­nat­ed closed ar­eas.

Cit­ing in­for­ma­tion pro­vid­ed by Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro, Alexan­der said the TTPS has strength­ened its re­cruit­ment and vet­ting process­es.

“The mea­sures in­clude en­hanced ver­i­fi­ca­tion and au­then­ti­ca­tion of ap­pli­cants’ doc­u­ments and ed­u­ca­tion­al qual­i­fi­ca­tions,” he said.

He added that the ser­vice has in­ten­si­fied back­ground in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to ap­pli­cants’ char­ac­ter, con­duct, as­so­ci­a­tions, re­li­a­bil­i­ty and over­all suit­abil­i­ty for ap­point­ment.

Ac­cord­ing to Alexan­der, of­fi­cers re­spon­si­ble for con­duct­ing these in­ves­ti­ga­tions have re­ceived ad­di­tion­al train­ing in risk as­sess­ment and cy­ber-in­ves­ti­ga­tion tech­niques. He said the in­tegri­ty screen­ing process ex­tends well be­yond the in­for­ma­tion sup­plied by ap­pli­cants.

“The en­hanced in­tegri­ty screen­ing mea­sures utilised by the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice in­clude com­mu­ni­ty-lev­el back­ground en­quiry, ver­i­fi­ca­tion and au­then­ti­ca­tion of in­for­ma­tion sub­mit­ted by ap­pli­cants, poly­graph ex­ams, psy­cho­log­i­cal as­sess­ment and drug test­ing,” he said.

“These mea­sures are in­tend­ed to pro­vide the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice with a more com­pre­hen­sive as­sess­ment of an ap­pli­cant’s suit­abil­i­ty for ap­point­ment.”

Asked whether all in­tegri­ty and back­ground checks are com­plet­ed be­fore re­cruits be­gin train­ing, Alexan­der replied, “Yes, they do. It must be com­plet­ed in or­der for en­rol­ment to start as an ap­pli­cant.”

Attzs al­so ques­tioned what mech­a­nisms ex­ist to iden­ti­fy of­fi­cers who re­peat­ed­ly breach reg­u­la­tions or ex­hib­it signs of mis­con­duct af­ter join­ing the ser­vice.

Alexan­der ac­knowl­edged that the TTPS does not op­er­ate a stand­alone ear­ly in­ter­ven­tion sys­tem. How­ev­er, he said sev­er­al ex­ist­ing mech­a­nisms work to­geth­er to flag prob­lem­at­ic be­hav­iour.

“These in­clude the per­for­mance ap­praisal man­age­ment sys­tem, su­per­vi­so­ry over­sight, pro­gres­sive dis­ci­pli­nary mea­sures and the work of the Pro­fes­sion­al Stan­dards Bu­reau and Po­lice Com­plaints Di­vi­sion,” he said.

Where con­cerns are iden­ti­fied, Alexan­der said in­ter­ven­tions may in­clude coun­selling, guid­ance, in­creased su­per­vi­sion, clear­ly de­fined per­for­mance ob­jec­tives and on­go­ing mon­i­tor­ing.

“Where war­rant­ed, Mr Pres­i­dent, mat­ters may pro­ceed to for­mal dis­ci­pline,” he added.

He said the com­bi­na­tion of per­for­mance eval­u­a­tions, su­per­vi­so­ry over­sight and dis­ci­pli­nary pro­ce­dures en­ables the TTPS to iden­ti­fy pat­terns of re­peat­ed non-com­pli­ance, dis­ci­pli­nary breach­es, poor per­for­mance and oth­er trou­bling con­duct.

“Where a con­cern or pat­tern of con­duct is iden­ti­fied, it is doc­u­ment­ed and brought to the of­fi­cer’s at­ten­tion and the ap­pro­pri­ate cor­rec­tive in­ter­ven­tion is de­ter­mined. The of­fi­cer’s re­sponse is then mon­i­tored and re­viewed,” he said.

If is­sues are not re­solved, he said, the mat­ter can be re­ferred for for­mal in­ves­ti­ga­tion and dis­ci­pli­nary ac­tion.

The ques­tions came days af­ter a High Court rul­ing or­der­ing the State to pay more than $1 mil­lion to a pun­dit and his fam­i­ly in a ma­li­cious pros­e­cu­tion case in­volv­ing po­lice of­fi­cers. In that judg­ment, the court raised se­ri­ous con­cerns about the con­duct of the of­fi­cers in­volved.

Alexan­der al­so told the Sen­ate the TTPS has im­ple­ment­ed re­forms in re­cruit­ment, train­ing, su­per­vi­sion, per­for­mance man­age­ment and ac­count­abil­i­ty, in­clud­ing stan­dard­ised re­cruit­ment pro­ce­dures and strength­ened pro­fes­sion­al de­vel­op­ment pro­grammes.

How­ev­er, when Attzs asked how the TTPS mea­sures pub­lic con­fi­dence and when its most re­cent as­sess­ment was con­duct­ed, Alexan­der said the in­for­ma­tion was not im­me­di­ate­ly avail­able.

“While I would like to give you the in­for­ma­tion right away, I sug­gest that we send it to you in writ­ing,” he said.