An 81-year-old woman was res­cued by po­lice af­ter she was al­leged­ly held against her will dur­ing a home in­va­sion in St Au­gus­tine on Wednes­day night.

Po­lice said they re­ceived a re­port around 7.10 pm that the woman was be­ing held at her home.

A par­ty of St Joseph po­lice of­fi­cers re­spond­ed and ar­rived at the prop­er­ty 10 min­utes lat­er.

Up­on en­ter­ing the house, of­fi­cers re­port­ed­ly found a man dressed in dark-coloured cloth­ing ran­sack­ing the woman’s bed­room.

The vic­tim was al­so in­side the house.

Po­lice de­tained a 35-year-old man from San­ta Cruz at the scene. He re­mains in po­lice cus­tody as in­ves­ti­ga­tions con­tin­ue in­to the in­ci­dent.

Po­lice did not dis­close whether any­thing was stolen from the home or whether the woman suf­fered any in­juries.

In an un­re­lat­ed, three men, in­clud­ing one want­ed in con­nec­tion with a sex­u­al of­fence, were ar­rest­ed dur­ing a joint an­ti-crime and road traf­fic ex­er­cise in south­ern Trinidad on Wednes­day.

The op­er­a­tion, dubbed Op­er­a­tion Res­olute Shield, was con­duct­ed be­tween 2 pm and 5 pm across the St Mary’s, Moru­ga, Bar­rack­pore and Princes Town polic­ing dis­tricts.

Po­lice said a 43-year-old labour­er from St Mary’s was ar­rest­ed in con­nec­tion with en­quiries in­to a sex­u­al of­fence, while a 37-year-old un­em­ployed man from Williamsville was al­so ar­rest­ed af­ter of­fi­cers al­leged­ly found him in pos­ses­sion of 1.19 kilo­grammes of mar­i­jua­na.

The third sus­pect, a 31-year-old PH dri­ver from In­di­an Walk, Moru­ga, was ar­rest­ed in con­nec­tion with en­quiries in­to a re­port­ed ve­hi­cle theft in Ma­yaro.

The op­er­a­tion in­volved of­fi­cers at­tached to the St Mary’s, Moru­ga, Bar­rack­pore and Princes Town Mu­nic­i­pal Po­lice Sta­tions.

Po­lice said the ex­er­cise was co­or­di­nat­ed by Sr Supt Hospedales, Supt Bertie, Woman Supt Bridglal, As­sis­tant Supts Pacheco, Ram­saran, Chu­lan and Rag­bir, and In­spec­tor Ma­haraj.

The op­er­a­tion was di­rect­ly su­per­vised by In­sp Charles, ag Sgt Har­riper­sad, ag Sgt Ram­dath, Cor­po­ral John­son and Woman Cpl James.