Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­ton@guardian.co.tt

Firearms deal­er Luke Hadeed yes­ter­day vol­un­tar­i­ly sur­ren­dered to the po­lice in­volved in the on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the op­er­a­tions of the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency (SSA).

Hadeed and at­tor­ney Om Lal­la vol­un­tar­i­ly walked in­to the Po­lice Ad­min­is­tra­tion Build­ing on Sackville Street, Port-of-Spain, just be­fore 11 am.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia af­ter­wards, Lal­la said they were co­op­er­at­ing ful­ly with the po­lice de­spite wide­spread so­cial me­dia spec­u­la­tion that Hadeed was be­lieved to be a sus­pect or on the run.

Lal­la made it clear Hadeed was nei­ther a sus­pect nor a per­son of in­ter­est, nor was he im­pli­cat­ed in the on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the im­por­ta­tion of two high-pow­ered sniper ri­fles in­to T&T which even­tu­al­ly il­le­gal­ly made their way in­to the hands of SSA agents.

Lal­la stat­ed, “My con­cern is that Luke Hadeed was tout­ed as some­one who is a sus­pect and in hid­ing. We’ve made it very clear by walk­ing in, that he is not a sus­pect. The po­lice have con­firmed he is not a sus­pect and not un­der ar­rest,” Lal­la said.

“In fact, we are co­op­er­at­ing with the on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion. The mat­ter re­mains very sen­si­tive, but my main con­cern was to en­sure that my client is not fac­ing any li­a­bil­i­ty of ar­rest or be­ing con­sid­ered a sus­pect.”

He added, “I can’t com­ment fur­ther due to the na­ture of the case. I be­lieve it is an un­prece­dent­ed mat­ter, and from my client’s point of view, we are ful­ly co­op­er­at­ing.”

He made it clear he did not know where the com­mu­ni­ca­tion that his client was on the run came from, but em­pha­sised there was no re­quest from the po­lice to sur­ren­der, nor was there any in­di­ca­tion that he was un­der ar­rest.

Hadeed’s com­pa­ny, AE Tac­ti­cal, has been part of the probe be­cause it im­port­ed the two sniper ri­fles which even­tu­al­ly made their way in­to the hands of SSA em­ploy­ees, who are not legal­ly em­pow­ered to han­dle such weapons as mem­bers of a civil­ian body.

Lal­la said the meet­ing with in­ves­ti­ga­tors last­ed three hours, and his client hand­ed over sen­si­tive in­for­ma­tion to in­ves­ti­ga­tors dur­ing the process.

He al­so gave some de­tails of the meet­ing with in­ves­ti­ga­tors.

“They were very cor­dial and very ac­com­mo­dat­ing. I mean, I have no com­plaints about it. Again, this is, on our end, a pro­fes­sion­al ex­er­cise rather than—we’re not a sus­pect and have not been treat­ed as such.”

This de­vel­op­ment fol­lows the ar­rest and de­ten­tion of Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher on Thurs­day in the on­go­ing case. She re­mained de­tained at the St Clair Po­lice Sta­tion yes­ter­day.

For­mer SSA di­rec­tor Ma­jor Roger Best was al­so tak­en in­to cus­tody by in­ves­ti­gat­ing of­fi­cers dur­ing a pre-dawn raid at his Ari­ma res­i­dence on Wednes­day.

Ad­mit­ting that the cur­rent probe had al­so raised is­sues about the coun­try’s na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty ap­pa­ra­tus, Lal­la said, “This is un­prece­dent­ed. The on­ly com­pa­ra­ble sit­u­a­tion was with for­mer Com­mis­sion­er Ran­dolph Bur­roughs. How­ev­er, we are in a time where, glob­al­ly, no one is above the law, and in­ves­ti­ga­tions must take their nat­ur­al course. Giv­en the cur­rent state of crime and on­go­ing de­vel­op­ments, these sit­u­a­tions nat­u­ral­ly raise con­cerns among the pub­lic.”