A re­quest for wit­ness pro­tec­tion for the fam­i­ly of the stu­dent who was bru­tal­ly at­tacked and se­vere­ly in­jured at the South East Port-of-Spain Sec­ondary School ear­li­er this month, has been de­nied.

This, af­ter se­nior po­lice of­fi­cials con­firmed the fam­i­ly failed to meet the cri­te­ria.

Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands the fa­ther of the 17-year-old, who is a po­lice of­fi­cer, ap­plied for the fam­i­ly to re­ceive po­lice pro­tec­tion fol­low­ing the in­ci­dent on June 3rd.

The vic­tim suf­fered a frac­tured nose, bro­ken tooth, blood clots in the eyes and oth­er in­juries.

The fa­ther re­port­ed­ly ex­pressed con­cerns about be­ing de­nied pro­tec­tion; and spoke of the fam­i­ly’s fear and con­cern over pos­si­ble back­lash fol­low­ing the in­ci­dent.

Re­spond­ing, Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice In­tel­li­gence and In­ves­ti­ga­tions, Suzette Mar­tin, said while the con­cerns raised by the fam­i­ly were thor­ough­ly re­viewed and treat­ed with the se­ri­ous­ness they war­rant, the threat lev­el iden­ti­fied did not sat­is­fy the thresh­old for full pro­tec­tion un­der the pro­gramme.

How­ev­er, DCP Mar­tin as­sured that ap­pro­pri­ate al­ter­na­tive mea­sures are in place to en­sure the fam­i­ly’s safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty.

The three stu­dents in­volved in the at­tack have since been sus­pend­ed.