Shane Su­perville

Se­nior Re­porter

shane.su­perville@guardian.co.tt

As en­quiries in­to al­le­ga­tions of mis­be­hav­iour in pub­lic of­fice con­tin­ue against sus­pend­ed Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher, sources have con­firmed that of­fi­cers from the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice’s (TTPS) White-Col­lar Crime Bu­reau are ex­pect­ed to meet to dis­cuss a new an­gle in the on­go­ing probe.

Sources close to the in­ves­ti­ga­tion said the unit will al­so meet with a rep­re­sen­ta­tive from the Of­fice of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP) to dis­cuss a “fi­nan­cial as­pect” of the mat­ter, which would in­volve ex­am­in­ing fi­nan­cial trans­ac­tions un­der­tak­en by the sus­pend­ed CoP, in­clud­ing the move­ment of cash, to bet­ter un­der­stand a time­line of events.

The source in­sist­ed that the en­quiry in­to the fi­nan­cial records would con­firm whether the in­ves­ti­ga­tion could be pur­sued from an­oth­er an­gle.

“This would re­quire some sig­nif­i­cant bu­reau­crat­ic work. As such, a probe re­quires us (the po­lice) to ap­proach a Mas­ter of the Court, who has to as­sess the in­for­ma­tion we have, and if they are sat­is­fied, will give ap­proval for the records and trans­ac­tions to be pulled from these (bank­ing) in­sti­tu­tions,” the source said.

“From then, once we see the records and what they con­tain, we can make a de­ci­sion on how is the best way to ap­proach this mat­ter.”

The source said the fi­nan­cial in­sti­tu­tions would have sev­en days to re­spond to any re­quest made by them.

Hare­wood-Christo­pher was ar­rest­ed as part of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the pro­cure­ment of two AX2 bolt-ac­tion sniper ri­fles, pur­port­ed­ly for use by the Strate­gic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion (SSA), on Jan­u­ary 30, but was re­leased on Feb­ru­ary 1 with­out any charges be­ing laid.

An­oth­er source con­firmed that of­fi­cers at­tached to DCP Suzette Mar­tin’s in­ves­tiga­tive unit have ap­proached the DPP on at least three oc­ca­sions for ad­vice on whether to lay charges of mis­be­hav­iour in pub­lic of­fice against Hare­wood-Christo­pher but were told to con­tin­ue work.

While at these meet­ings, ad­vice was al­so sought re­gard­ing pos­si­ble charges be­ing laid against for­mer SSA di­rec­tor Roger Best but no in­struc­tions were giv­en for him to be charged.

The source not­ed that while in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to Best were con­tin­u­ing, no con­clu­sive ev­i­dence has been found link­ing him to any crime. How­ev­er, the of­fi­cer main­tained that the en­quiry in­to Best’s ac­tiv­i­ties were “not yet con­clud­ed,” as this could al­so pos­si­bly form part of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to Hare­wood-Christo­pher.

When con­tact­ed for com­ment yes­ter­day, how­ev­er, act­ing Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Ju­nior Ben­jamin said he was not aware of the de­vel­op­ments, as he did not get the time to dis­cuss the mat­ter with DCP Mar­tin dur­ing their meet­ing ear­li­er.

“The truth is I can­not say at this time and I don’t want to com­ment on some­thing I have no in­for­ma­tion on be­cause it could be wrong.”

Guardian Me­dia al­so con­tact­ed DCP Mar­tin for com­ment but was un­suc­cess­ful. In­stead, Mar­tin replied to What­sApp mes­sages ask­ing Guardian Me­dia to “send the in­for­ma­tion,” on where in­for­ma­tion on the sta­tus of the probe sur­faced. When told the in­for­ma­tion was ac­quired through sources, DCP Mar­tin did not re­spond fur­ther.

Guardian Me­dia al­so con­tact­ed Hare­wood-Christo­pher’s at­tor­ney Pamela El­der, SC, who al­so said she was un­aware of the White-Col­lar Crime Bu­reau be­ing brought in­to the probe but com­ment­ed on the tim­ing of the de­ci­sion.

“It is odd that this is their po­si­tion. They are do­ing this af­ter my client was ar­rest­ed,” El­der said.

While speak­ing with re­porters af­ter Hare­wood-Christo­pher’s re­lease from the St Clair Po­lice Sta­tion on Feb­ru­ary 1, El­der had ques­tioned the ba­sis for her client’s ar­rest, ar­gu­ing there was not “a drop of ev­i­dence” against her.

“It is out­ra­geous be­cause the CoP was ques­tioned – not as a per­son from whom the of­fi­cers want­ed in­for­ma­tion – but she was cau­tioned. And we all should know a cau­tion is ad­min­is­tered to a per­son against whom the of­fi­cer has rea­son­able grounds to sus­pect the per­son has com­mit­ted an of­fence,” El­der told re­porters at the time.