An­na-Lisa Paul

Al­though po­lice killings have more than dou­bled since the year be­gan, act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (CoP) Ju­nior Ben­jamin has come out in de­fence of his of­fi­cers, as he warned that the po­lice will not back down when con­front­ed by armed crim­i­nals.

In­di­cat­ing that they had record­ed 85 mur­ders for the year up to March 19, com­pared to 122 in 2024 and 130 in 2023 for the same pe­ri­od, Ben­jamin said, “We will be re­lent­less in our pur­suit to en­sure the safe­ty of T&T, and we will chal­lenge any­one who threat­ens that peace. We will not stop, and we will not back down.”

Fol­low­ing the death of An­tho­ny Pitt at the hands of the po­lice dur­ing an ex­er­cise in the Mor­vant dis­trict on March 17, the Po­lice Com­plaints Au­thor­i­ty (PCA) con­firmed ex­tra-ju­di­cial killings had dou­bled since the year be­gan, com­pared to the same pe­ri­od last year.

Point­ing to the sta­tis­tics re­gard­ing the num­ber of per­sons who had been killed by the po­lice, the PCA said this had al­so in­creased by 100 per cent.

For the pe­ri­od Jan­u­ary 1, 2024, to March 24, 2024, six fa­tal po­lice-in­volved shoot­ings in­volv­ing nine vic­tims were record­ed.

These fig­ures shot up for the pe­ri­od Jan­u­ary 1, 2025, to March 15, 2025, as 13 fa­tal po­lice-in­volved shoot­ings in­volv­ing 18 vic­tims were record­ed.

Say­ing they were con­cerned by the in­crease in the num­ber of po­lice-in­volved killings, PCA di­rec­tor David West on Mon­day said they were al­so look­ing at the lack of body-worn cam­era footage from po­lice of­fi­cers in­volved in the shoot­ings.

He said, “This is de­spite the de­part­men­tal or­der man­dat­ing po­lice of­fi­cers to turn on their cam­eras when they are dis­patched for du­ty.”

West said the PCA had al­so made sev­er­al rec­om­men­da­tions to the CoP for po­lice of­fi­cers to wear and turn on their body cam­eras.

Asked to re­spond to the PCA’s con­cerns and if footage had been ob­tained from any of the body cam­eras that of­fi­cers were sup­posed to have been wear­ing, Ben­jamin said the sup­ply was lim­it­ed and not every­one had ac­cess to them.

How­ev­er, he said, “Once you have ac­cess to it, you must wear it.”

How­ev­er, he said he was not about to make it an is­sue where of­fi­cers were ac­cused of not wear­ing them and/or turn­ing them on when out in the field.

“There is no need for dis­ci­pli­nary ac­tion at this time,” Ben­jamin said.

Al­so con­tact­ed on the is­sue, T&T Po­lice Ser­vice So­cial and Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion (TTPSS­WA) pres­i­dent, ASP Gideon Dick­son, said in­ves­ti­ga­tions were con­duct­ed in all po­lice-in­volved killings.

“We have seen po­lice be­ing brought be­fore the court to an­swer charges,” he said.

He too urged of­fi­cers to utilise the body-worn cam­eras.

Re­in­forc­ing the warn­ing by the act­ing CoP Ben­jamin for crim­i­nals not to en­gage the po­lice, Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (DCP) Suzette Mar­tin yes­ter­day said of­fi­cers will re­spond as re­quired to up­hold the law and pro­tect cit­i­zens.

She ad­vised, “I am mak­ing a strong and ur­gent ap­peal to the pub­lic: Do not en­gage the po­lice in ways that could lead to dead­ly con­se­quences.”

The se­nior of­fi­cer added, “The of­fi­cers of the TTPS are high­ly trained pro­fes­sion­als, com­mit­ted to up­hold­ing law and or­der while pro­tect­ing the rights of all cit­i­zens.”

Re­spond­ing to the in­crease in the num­ber of fa­tal po­lice-in­volved killings, the DCP, In­tel­li­gence and In­ves­ti­ga­tions coun­tered, “In re­cent times, we have seen an in­crease in in­di­vid­u­als con­fronting, re­sist­ing, and even at­tack­ing of­fi­cers while they are ex­e­cut­ing their re­spon­si­bil­i­ties. This is dan­ger­ous, un­law­ful, and will not be tol­er­at­ed.”

Mar­tin added, “This is deeply trou­bling for all of us, as no of­fi­cer wants to take a life, and no fam­i­ly should have to mourn the loss of a loved one due to vi­o­lent en­coun­ters with the po­lice.”

Ex­press­ing deep­est sym­pa­thies to all fam­i­lies af­fect­ed by these in­ci­dents, Mar­tin said, “The loss of any life, re­gard­less of the cir­cum­stances, is re­gret­table, and we re­main com­mit­ted to en­sur­ing that jus­tice and ac­count­abil­i­ty pre­vail.”

She added, “Po­lice of­fi­cers have a du­ty to pro­tect and serve, but they are al­so trained to re­spond with force if their lives or the lives of oth­ers are in dan­ger.

“If you re­sist ar­rest, at­tack an of­fi­cer, or threat­en pub­lic safe­ty with firearms or oth­er weapons, the risk of a lethal out­come in­creas­es sig­nif­i­cant­ly.”

She as­sured, nev­er­the­less, that the in­crease in fa­tal po­lice shoot­ings would be thor­ough­ly re­viewed and in­ves­ti­gat­ed.

She said, “While we must ac­knowl­edge the dif­fi­cult re­al­i­ties of­fi­cers face in com­bat­ing crime, we al­so reaf­firm that the ex­ces­sive or un­jus­ti­fied use of force will not be tol­er­at­ed.

“The TTPS re­mains com­mit­ted to up­hold­ing the rule of law, re­spect­ing hu­man rights, and main­tain­ing pub­lic trust and con­fi­dence.”

She al­so is­sued an­oth­er call for the pub­lic to work with the po­lice to pre­vent un­nec­es­sary loss of life.

“I urge every per­son in our coun­try to choose peace, com­pli­ance, and di­a­logue over vi­o­lence and con­fronta­tion,” she said.