An­na-Lisa Paul

Two days af­ter a loaded pis­tol was dis­cov­ered among the prison pop­u­la­tion at the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison (MSP), Gold­en Grove Road, Arou­ca, in­ten­si­fied se­cu­ri­ty search­es were car­ried out at the Port-of-Spain Prison yes­ter­day.

A con­tin­gent of po­lice and prison of­fi­cers, in ri­ot gear with their faces cov­ered, were briefed by se­nior of­fi­cials ahead of walk­ing in­to the Fred­er­ick Street fa­cil­i­ty around 9.30 am.

Guardian Me­dia was told the search­es formed part of the se­cu­ri­ty ap­pa­ra­tus by prison of­fi­cials to lo­cate and con­fis­cate con­tra­band items be­ing smug­gled in­to the var­i­ous pris­ons over the past year.

On Wednes­day, a loaded gun was dis­cov­ered at the MSP, fol­low­ing which a to­tal lock­down took place.

Af­ter the ex­er­cise, con­duct­ed be­tween 12 noon and 7.30 pm, of­fi­cers re­cov­ered one 9 mm pis­tol with sev­en rounds of 9 mm am­mu­ni­tion; sev­en cell phones; and ten im­pro­vised weapons.

The op­er­a­tion was spear­head­ed by Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice, In­tel­li­gence and In­ves­ti­ga­tions, Suzette Mar­tin, with as­sis­tance from As­sis­tant Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice North East Rishi Singh and Pris­ons Com­mis­sion­er Car­los Cor­raspe.

Al­so lend­ing sup­port were of­fi­cers from the North­ern Di­vi­sion North Gang Unit, the Spe­cial In­ves­ti­ga­tions Unit, the Guard and Emer­gency Branch, Crime Scene In­ves­ti­ga­tors, the Ca­nine Unit, and the Prison Emer­gency Re­sponse Unit.