Akash Sama­roo

Lead Ed­i­tor-Pol­i­tics

akash.sama­roo@cnc3.co.tt

The Gov­ern­ment is mov­ing to over­haul Trinidad and To­ba­go’s pro­ba­tion sys­tem by in­tro­duc­ing “split sen­tenc­ing,” a mea­sure that com­bines jail time with su­per­vised re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion, in a bid to re­duce re­peat of­fend­ing and ease prison over­crowd­ing.

The Pro­ba­tion of Of­fend­ers (Amend­ment) Bill, 2026, was de­bat­ed yes­ter­day in the Sen­ate. At the heart of the amend­ment is the in­tro­duc­tion of hy­brid sen­tenc­ing. Cur­rent­ly, ju­di­cial of­fi­cers gen­er­al­ly choose be­tween a term of im­pris­on­ment or a pro­ba­tion or­der. Un­der the new leg­is­la­tion, the court will be em­pow­ered to im­pose both a cus­to­di­al sen­tence fol­lowed by a manda­to­ry pe­ri­od of pro­ba­tion.

In pre­sent­ing the Bill, Jus­tice Min­is­ter De­vesh Ma­haraj de­scribed the re­form as land­mark.

“This split-sen­tenc­ing op­tion en­sures that of­fend­ers are held ac­count­able through im­pris­on­ment but are giv­en struc­tured sup­port to rein­te­grate in­to so­ci­ety,” he said.

How­ev­er, he warned that if a pro­ba­tion­er com­mits an­oth­er of­fence dur­ing their pro­ba­tion­ary pe­ri­od, they would have to serve the full sen­tence.

“We are of­fer­ing a sec­ond chance: come back in­to so­ci­ety, com­plete your re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion, and you get a pass to rein­te­grate. If not, the court will in­ter­vene, and you will serve your full sen­tence,” Ma­haraj ex­plained.

To com­ple­ment this leg­is­la­tion, the Jus­tice Min­is­ter in­di­cat­ed that a Pa­role Bill is forth­com­ing. This will es­tab­lish a statu­to­ry body re­spon­si­ble for as­sess­ing in­mates for pa­role el­i­gi­bil­i­ty af­ter serv­ing a de­fined por­tion of their sen­tence—ei­ther one-quar­ter or one-half, de­pend­ing on the of­fence.

The pro­posed sys­tem al­so in­tro­duces ac­tive su­per­vi­sion mea­sures, en­sur­ing that re­lease from prison does not mark the end of state over­sight. Of­fend­ers will be sub­ject to strict con­di­tions, in­clud­ing elec­tron­ic mon­i­tor­ing, manda­to­ry par­tic­i­pa­tion in re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion pro­grammes, and reg­u­lar re­port­ing to pa­role or pro­ba­tion of­fi­cers.

Min­is­ter Ma­haraj al­so said the leg­is­la­tion would con­tribute to more hu­mane prison con­di­tions.

“Re­duc­ing the prison pop­u­la­tion through re­forms to crim­i­nal pro­ce­dure and sen­tenc­ing pol­i­cy rep­re­sents a more ef­fec­tive, ef­fi­cient, and en­dur­ing ap­proach to ad­dress­ing over­crowd­ing,” he said.

Con­cerns about vic­tims

Op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor Faris Al-Rawi ex­pressed sup­port for split sen­tenc­ing but raised con­cerns that the gov­ern­ment was not ad­e­quate­ly con­sid­er­ing the vic­tims’ rights. He pro­posed an amend­ment re­quir­ing that pro­ba­tion­ers be brought back be­fore the court im­me­di­ate­ly up­on be­ing charged with an­oth­er of­fence, rather than wait­ing for a con­vic­tion.

“Pun­ish­ment for those on pro­ba­tion should not be con­tin­gent on wait­ing for a con­vic­tion,” Al-Rawi ar­gued.

“For years, we have strug­gled with de­lays in the court sys­tem. It is im­pos­si­ble to main­tain the 1943 frame­work where pro­ba­tion is on­ly re­voked up­on con­vic­tion. The court ought to re­vis­it pro­ba­tion sta­tus the mo­ment a pro­ba­tion­er is charged, and I pro­pose that this be in­clud­ed in the law.”

In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor An­tho­ny Vieira wel­comed the pro­posed leg­is­la­tion, not­ing that it aligns with prin­ci­ples long recog­nised by crim­i­nol­o­gists, courts, and pol­i­cy­mak­ers.

“Pun­ish­ment alone does not al­ways pro­duce jus­tice, and in­car­cer­a­tion alone does not nec­es­sar­i­ly pro­duce re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion. A jus­tice sys­tem wor­thy of its name must pro­tect so­ci­ety, hold of­fend­ers ac­count­able, and seek to re­store in­di­vid­u­als so they may re­turn as pro­duc­tive mem­bers of the com­mu­ni­ty,” Vieira said.

He em­pha­sised that split sen­tenc­ing is not a “get out of jail free” card, but a mea­sure that will min­imise dis­rup­tion to fam­i­ly life, par­tic­u­lar­ly when the of­fend­er is the pri­ma­ry bread­win­ner.

“The tra­di­tion­al le­gal sys­tem can com­pound fam­i­ly hard­ship. Im­pris­on­ment of­ten re­sults in loss of in­come, emo­tion­al trau­ma, break­down of parental re­la­tion­ships, and long-term so­cial dis­lo­ca­tion. Chil­dren, in par­tic­u­lar, suf­fer when a par­ent is re­moved from the house­hold,” he said.

Un­der the pro­posed leg­is­la­tion, el­i­gi­bil­i­ty for pa­role will not be de­ter­mined by a fixed list of crimes but by a ju­di­cial as­sess­ment of the of­fend­er and the cir­cum­stances of the case.