Chester Sam­bra­no

The Po­lice Ser­vice says four more il­le­gal firearms have been tak­en off the streets and out of the hands of crim­i­nals fol­low­ing a se­ries of co­or­di­nat­ed in­tel­li­gence-dri­ven ex­er­cis­es con­duct­ed across sev­er­al polic­ing Di­vi­sions yes­ter­day.

In the first ex­er­cise, of­fi­cers of the In­ter-Agency Task Force (IATF) con­duct­ed an ex­er­cise be­tween 10 am and 11 am, in the Orop­une Gar­dens dis­trict, dur­ing which they pro­ceed­ed to Ro­maine Lands.

There, the of­fi­cers ob­served three men all armed with guns.

Up­on see­ing the of­fi­cers, the men ran off.

A search of the area re­sult­ed in of­fi­cers find­ing one 12-gauge shot­gun and five car­tridges in a drain.

Fur­ther checks re­sult­ed in a ri­fle loaded with a mag­a­zine con­tain­ing 12 rounds of am­mu­ni­tion al­so be­ing found and seized.

In the Port of Spain Di­vi­sion, IATF of­fi­cers with the as­sis­tance of the Guard and Emer­gency Branch, were on mo­bile pa­trol in the Laven­tille dis­trict around 11 pm, yes­ter­day, when they searched a grey Hyundai mo­tor ve­hi­cle.

The search re­sult­ed in of­fi­cers find­ing a Glock pis­tol loaded with a mag­a­zine con­tain­ing 16 rounds of am­mu­ni­tion.

Mean­while, Task Force of­fi­cers con­duct­ed an ex­er­cise be­tween 9:30 am and 2 pm yes­ter­day in the West­ern Di­vi­sion, dur­ing which they pro­ceed­ed to Mar­aval, where they con­duct­ed a search of an aban­doned wood­en struc­ture.

The search re­sult­ed in the of­fi­cers find­ing one re­volver in a black plas­tic bag.

And, in the North­ern Di­vi­sion, an Op­er­a­tion Grand Slam ex­er­cise was con­duct­ed in the Ari­ma dis­trict be­tween 9 am and 1 pm yes­ter­day.

Dur­ing the ex­er­cise, of­fi­cers of the Pin­to Road Po­lice Post, Ca­nine Unit and Mu­nic­i­pal Task Force pro­ceed­ed to Sama­roo Vil­lage, Ari­ma where they con­duct­ed a search of a house with a male oc­cu­pant.

The search re­port­ed­ly re­sult­ed in of­fi­cers find­ing a to­tal of 1.8 kilo­grammes of co­caine on the premis­es.

The 50-year-old male sus­pect was ar­rest­ed in con­nec­tion with the find.

Mean­while, of­fi­cers of the Port of Spain Gang and In­tel­li­gence Unit con­duct­ed an ex­er­cise be­tween 4:30 pm and 9 pm, yes­ter­day in the Port of Spain Di­vi­sion, dur­ing which they found and seized sev­en ful­ly grown mar­i­jua­na plants in a St. James house.

The same par­ty of of­fi­cers then pro­ceed­ed to Char­lotte Street, around 7:30 pm and ar­rest­ed two men for pos­ses­sion of a quan­ti­ty of mar­i­jua­na.

And, in the South­ern Di­vi­sion, Task Force of­fi­cers con­duct­ed an ex­er­cise be­tween 10:30 am and 3 pm, on Mon­day, March 20, dur­ing which they ar­rest­ed four male sus­pects for var­i­ous of­fences in­clud­ing pos­ses­sion of mar­i­jua­na, pos­ses­sion of co­caine, dis­or­der­ly be­hav­iour and re­sist­ing ar­rest.

In­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to all the above mat­ters are on­go­ing.