AN­NA-LISA PAUL

Se­nior Re­porter

an­nal­isa.paul@guardian.co.tt

As the an­niver­sary of the killings of two se­cu­ri­ty guards dur­ing a mon­ey heist in La Ro­main last year ap­proach­es, an es­tate po­lice of­fi­cer lost his life in the line of du­ty yes­ter­day.

Hase­ly Au­gus­tine, 46, who worked for Tele­com Se­cu­ri­ty Ser­vices Ltd, was part of a four-mem­ber team re­plen­ish­ing cash at an Au­to­mat­ic Teller Ma­chine (ATM) at DS Plaza, Chin Chin Road, Cunu­pia, just be­fore noon yes­ter­day, when they were con­front­ed by five armed men.

It was re­port­ed that a strug­gle en­sued be­tween then men, who were dressed as po­lice of­fi­cers, and the dri­ver of the se­cu­ri­ty van, dur­ing which time sev­er­al shots were fired and Au­gus­tine was hit.

As he col­lapsed, the ban­dits were able to wres­tle away a firearm from one of Au­gus­tine’s col­leagues be­fore es­cap­ing in a wait­ing car. The ve­hi­cle was lat­er found aban­doned at Wel­come Road, Cunu­pia.

As on­look­ers and col­leagues gath­ered around try­ing to as­sist the in­jured of­fi­cer, Au­gus­tine suc­cumbed to his in­juries, bring­ing tears to the eyes of those present.

Sad­dened and shocked by the loss yes­ter­day, Es­tate Po­lice As­so­ci­a­tion (EPA) pres­i­dent Deryck Richard­son de­scribed the killing as a “re-trau­ma­ti­sa­tion” for all pri­vate se­cu­ri­ty guards and the fam­i­lies of fall­en guards Jef­frey Pe­ters and Jer­ry Stu­art, who were killed in sim­i­lar cir­cum­stances last year.

Speak­ing by tele­phone, Richard­son said, “I have spo­ken to of­fi­cers at Tele­com, and they are in a mess right now.”

Pe­ters again called on the Gov­ern­ment to con­sid­er their re­quest to re­move du­ties and tax­es on bul­let-proof vests.

“We are hope­ful the Gov­ern­ment will see it now in this bud­get, to re­move all tax­es and du­ties from those vests so the em­ploy­ers can pur­chase it more eas­i­ly and read­i­ly,” he said.

In ad­di­tion, Richard­son urged the Bu­reau of Stan­dards to es­tab­lish stan­dards for the im­por­ta­tion of vests. He al­so ap­pealed to the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty to man­date all se­cu­ri­ty com­pa­nies to con­duct cash-in-tran­sit ac­tiv­i­ties in ar­moured or re­in­forced ve­hi­cles.

In a state­ment yes­ter­day, RBC said it was “shocked and deeply sad­dened by the trag­ic loss of life” at its Cunu­pia ATM site.

“Our thoughts and sym­pa­thies are with the fam­i­ly and loved ones of those in­volved. RBC takes the safe­ty and well-be­ing of our em­ploy­ees, clients, and com­mu­ni­ties se­ri­ous­ly. We are con­cerned and trou­bled about the es­ca­lat­ing lev­el of vi­o­lence in the com­mu­ni­ties we serve,” the state­ment said.

RBC said it was work­ing with the Bankers’ As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T (BATT) and oth­er stake­hold­ers to pro­mote safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty pre­cau­tions for the pub­lic.

Ca­roni East MP: No end to crime epi­dem­ic

Mean­while, Ca­roni East MP Dr Rishad Seecher­an lament­ed Au­gus­tine’s mur­der.

“The hor­ri­fy­ing and cold-blood­ed mur­der of a se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cer on du­ty to­day (Thurs­day) shows there is no end to the crime epi­dem­ic, de­spite nev­er-end­ing promis­es by Min­is­ter Hinds,” Seecha­ran said.

Claim­ing the slain of­fi­cer was yet an­oth­er law-abid­ing cit­i­zen who had lost his life and left his fam­i­ly with­out a hus­band and fa­ther, Seecher­an ac­cused the cur­rent ad­min­is­tra­tion of, “Mak­ing no ef­fort to curb the crime cat­a­stro­phe.”

He re­ferred to pre­vi­ous con­ver­sa­tions in and out of the Par­lia­ment on crime, which he felt had fall­en on deaf ears.

“I have ad­vised the au­thor­i­ties that the dis­tricts of cen­tral Trinidad, in­clud­ing those in Ca­roni East, have be­come killing zones.

“sev­er­al com­mu­ni­ties of Ca­roni East have be­come killing fields, with hu­man car­nage, bru­tal home in­va­sions, as­saults, car-jack­ings, gun wars, home in­va­sions, drug par­ties, and oth­er dread­ful acts of law­less­ness.

“The ap­palling killing of the se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cer adds to a list of mur­ders on the streets, re­cov­ery of body parts in wa­ter cours­es, and brazen shoot­ings at bars,” he said.