An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

Act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Ju­nior Ben­jamin has dis­missed claims there was a “pow­er play” at work by se­nior T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) mem­bers to un­der­mine and wrest con­trol from his pre­de­ces­sor, Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher.

In fact, Ben­jamin yes­ter­day de­fend­ed the team of in­ves­ti­ga­tors led by the Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice, In­tel­li­gence and In­ves­ti­ga­tions (I&I), Suzette Mar­tin, as he said she and of­fi­cers in her unit per­formed their du­ties with­out favour or ill-will.

In an ex­clu­sive in­ter­view at his of­fice at the Po­lice Ad­min­is­tra­tion Build­ing, Port-of-Spain, last evening, Ben­jamin said, “I think we need to be very hon­est in look­ing at what was said by the DPP and al­so by the judge, and all of them spoke high­ly in terms of the ar­rest that was made, which in it­self was law­ful.”

He said there was no witch-hunt.

“The TTPS was not on a pow­er hunt. Even as the act­ing CoP, I have a re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and I am not above the law. No­body is above the law,” he said.

He re­it­er­at­ed that he and his of­fi­cers would con­tin­ue to dis­charge their du­ties with­out fear, favour, mal­ice or ill will.

“The law has the abil­i­ty to vin­di­cate its own cause, and as seen, the law was test­ed and even though she (Hare­wood-Christo­pher) was ar­rest­ed, again, we recog­nised that we did not reach the thresh­old and we are for­ev­er grate­ful that that judg­ment could be made even be­fore it gets to the court.”

Mar­tin, in a state­ment yes­ter­day, al­so de­fend­ed the in­ves­ti­ga­tion and stressed that she fol­lowed the law.

“I did not ini­ti­ate this in­ves­ti­ga­tion on my own. In keep­ing with es­tab­lished prac­tices, I con­sult­ed with the DPP, Mr Roger Gas­pard, SC, up­on re­ceipt of this in­ves­ti­ga­tion and ob­tained guid­ance from him every step through the in­ves­tiga­tive process. I com­plied with the guid­ance giv­en at all times.”

Mean­while, Ben­jamin, whose act­ing ap­point­ment as the CoP re­mained in ef­fect af­ter Hare­wood-Christo­pher was sent on 66 days’ leave yes­ter­day by Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty, Roger Alexan­der, said his in­stru­ment of ap­point­ment had no ex­piry date at­tached.

“For this, I am grate­ful,” he said.

Thank­ing both the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion and those un­der his com­mand for dis­play­ing that lev­el of trust and faith in his con­tin­ued lead­er­ship, he reaf­firmed his com­mit­ment to keep­ing the TTPS fo­cused on achiev­ing its mis­sion and vi­sion to make every place safe in T&T.

‘Won­der­ful to see Er­la’

Ben­jamin ex­plained that when he met with Hare­wood-Christo­pher on Mon­day at the of­fice, the two shared what was tan­ta­mount to a “moth­er and son re­la­tion­ship.”

“We al­ways had that lev­el of men­tor­ship and mentee re­la­tion­ship and, there­fore, meet­ing with her was a re­al­ly won­der­ful sight. I wel­comed her. I con­grat­u­lat­ed her.

“I mean, it is a won­der­ful, to me, judge­ment, that speaks to the po­lice ser­vice breath­ing that sigh of re­lief that our CoP can be re­in­stat­ed, so it was a joy. We had a very pro­fes­sion­al talk.”

Re­it­er­at­ing that he had noth­ing but re­spect and ad­mi­ra­tion for Hare­wood-Christo­pher, Ben­jamin said, “The TTPS con­tin­ues to wish Ma’am Er­la Christo­pher all the best. She has made tremen­dous con­tri­bu­tions to the po­lice ser­vice and for this, we are re­al­ly grate­ful.”