GUARDIAN ME­DIA IN­VES­TI­GA­TIONS DESK

Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (DCP) Suzette Mar­tin says that Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher will not re­main the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er while still un­der ac­tive in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

How­ev­er, up to late yes­ter­day, she did not elab­o­rate on what it meant for the ser­vice or who would fill the void.

Hare­wood-Christo­pher was de­tained by in­ves­ti­gat­ing of­fi­cers since Thurs­day evening for ques­tion­ing over her grant­i­ng of an im­port li­cence to se­cure mil­i­tary-grade equip­ment for the Se­cu­ri­ty Ser­vices Agency (SSA). The Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP) yes­ter­day or­dered her re­lease.

At the St Clair po­lice sta­tion min­utes af­ter her re­lease, the ques­tion was put to Hare­wood-Christo­pher’s lawyer Pamela El­der, SC, on whether she would re­sume du­ties as CoP.

“That will have to be dis­cussed. We have to put pen to pa­per,” El­der told the me­dia.

Dur­ing Hare­wood-Christo­pher’s de­ten­tion, the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PolSC), which su­per­vis­es the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice, was mak­ing moves to ap­point an act­ing com­mis­sion­er.

Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands that af­ter the PolSC was in­formed of the ques­tion­ing and pos­si­ble ar­rest of Hare­wood-Christo­pher, they sought le­gal ad­vice on how to deal with the mat­ter ad­min­is­tra­tive­ly with lit­tle le­gal blow­back.

DCP Ju­nior Ben­jamin is at the top of the PolSC’s mer­it list to re­place Hare­wood-Christo­pher as an act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice.

How­ev­er, Guardian Me­dia was told that Mar­tin is favoured by some quar­ters in the Gov­ern­ment to fill Hare­wood-Christo­pher’s shoes.

Ben­jamin, Mar­tin and Natasha George are the three deputy com­mis­sion­ers of po­lice in the TTPS.

Guardian Me­dia was re­li­ably in­formed that a re­quest was made by the PolSC for Hare­wood-Christo­pher to “be sep­a­rat­ed” from her of­fice while the in­ves­ti­ga­tion re­mains on­go­ing.

De­spite her re­lease and the fact that the in­ves­ti­ga­tion is on­go­ing, on­ly the PolSC can say whether she will re­turn to the job or not.

Up to late yes­ter­day, Guardian Me­dia was un­able to as­cer­tain those de­tails.

Ac­cord­ing to the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice and Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice 1175 (Se­lec­tion Process) (No 2) Or­der 2021 un­der the con­sti­tu­tion, “Where–(a) the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice is or is like­ly to be– (i) ab­sent from Trinidad and To­ba­go; (ii) on va­ca­tion leave; or (iii) un­able by rea­son of ill­ness or any oth­er rea­son to per­form the func­tions of the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice; or (b) the of­fice of the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice is or is like­ly to be­come va­cant, the Com­mis­sion shall se­lect the most se­nior of­fi­cer on the Or­der of Mer­it List and sub­mit that of­fi­cer’s name to the Pres­i­dent in ac­cor­dance with the pro­ce­dure set out in sec­tion 123 of the Con­sti­tu­tion.”