An­na-Lisa Paul

Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher yes­ter­day gave the as­sur­ance that the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) will be re­lent­less in its pur­suit of gun-tot­ing gang­sters in­tent on caus­ing may­hem.

“The TTPS is very con­cerned about the con­tin­u­ing loss of life through gun and gang vi­o­lence and re­mains very res­olute in tak­ing the nec­es­sary ac­tions to ef­fec­tive­ly re­duce this high in­ci­dence of crime and vi­o­lence in our coun­try,” she said in a state­ment.

The CoP said the TTPS would “ag­gres­sive­ly and re­lent­less­ly pur­sue those per­sons bent on caus­ing pain and dis­tress to in­no­cent cit­i­zens.”

How­ev­er, her words were of lit­tle com­fort to the rel­a­tives of Ker­nel­la Saun­ders who are strug­gling to come to terms with her death. They said while they have for­giv­en Saun­ders’ killer, it is an act that they will nev­er for­get or be able to get past.

At the fam­i­ly home at Daniel Trace, Mal­abar, Saun­ders’s sis­ter Michelle Saun­ders-Cal­len­der said: “We are a house­hold where we go to work, go to church, and are at home. That’s it, that’s our life.”

Saun­ders was killed in a shoot­ing in­ci­dent at the Mal­abar Train Line Mi­ni Mart, cor­ner of Pope Av­enue and Daniel Trace, around 9.15 pm on Tues­day. An­oth­er woman iden­ti­fied on­ly as Lashay, of Fyz­abad, was al­so killed whilst the in­tend­ed tar­get sus­tained in­juries and was hos­pi­tal­ized in a sta­ble con­di­tion up to yes­ter­day.

Saun­ders, a 35-year-old ad­min­is­tra­tive clerk em­ployed at Cipri­ani Labour Col­lege, was look­ing for­ward to cel­e­brat­ing her birth­day on May 4. The youngest of six chil­dren, she was de­scribed as very pri­vate by rel­a­tives and co-work­ers.

Saun­ders-Cal­len­der said: “She wouldn’t talk much at all to any­body. If you ask any­body around the area, she wouldn’t even hard­ly tell any­one good morn­ing un­less she felt to as she was very pri­vate and qui­et.”

Saun­ders-Cal­len­der said her health-con­scious sis­ter had re­turned from ex­er­cis­ing at the Lar­ry Gomes Sta­di­um and was about to get din­ner when the fa­tal in­ci­dent oc­curred.

“She was go­ing to the kitchen to get a spe­cial meal she had pre­pared for her­self . . . and that’s when she get the bul­let in her neck,” she said.

Saun­ders died when a bul­let pierced one of the bed­room win­dows and the se­cu­ri­ty door to her bed­room be­fore strik­ing her in the back of the head and ex­it­ing through her fore­head.

She had just closed the bed­room door and was stand­ing in the cor­ri­dor and fell face for­ward.

Saun­ders-Cal­len­der said: “I found her. I was out­side wash­ing when it hap­pened. Them men just spray up bul­lets and I came in and met my sis­ter on the ground.

“I saw my daugh­ter and grand­son in the TV room and they were okay and as I went to check her, I see her ly­ing on the ground. I was go­ing to say Chicky (pet name), every­thing fin­ish you can get up now but some­thing was off…as I walk up to her, I just see this pool of blood and start to bawl.”

Her voice hoarse af­ter cry­ing most of Tues­day night, Saun­ders-Cal­len­der’s eyes filled with tears as she said: “She was qui­et but when she liked you, she loved you. “She would let you know things as it is. She was very out­spo­ken and would give every­thing you can ask for. She was giv­ing, that was my sis­ter.”

Rel­a­tives re­called Saun­ders’ love for Niger­ian tele­vi­sion shows and her abil­i­ty to mim­ic the Niger­ian ac­cent.

Her niece, Re­nee Cal­len­der said: “She would use it very flu­ent­ly and would hit you it the most ran­dom times.”

Saun­ders, who was sin­gle and had no chil­dren, avoid­ed lim­ing and be­ing out late due to the wors­en­ing crime sit­u­a­tion. She had arranged to get trans­port to and from work dai­ly to avoid be­com­ing a vic­tim of crime.

Saun­ders-Cal­len­der said: “Right now I fraid to even go in my sis­ter’s room. I’m just see­ing this big hole. She had a tow­el by the door, and there’s a hole in the tow­el and the door. It’s not safe right now… it’s very scary stay­ing here right now but this is our home.”

CoP Hare­wood-Christo­pher ac­knowl­edged the im­pact homi­cides are hav­ing on the na­tion­al psy­che. She said the TTPS is fo­cused on im­ple­ment­ing strate­gies to re­duce gun vi­o­lence, se­ri­ous crimes and mur­ders.

“We will per­sist in our ef­forts to rid the streets of il­le­gal firearms, the choice of weapons for crim­i­nals,” she said.

“In 2023, we have al­ready seized 219 il­le­gal firearms and 6,821 rounds of am­mu­ni­tion and that cam­paign will con­tin­ue. Homi­cide de­tec­tives are on the ground work­ing as­sid­u­ous­ly, con­duct­ing in­quiries and ex­pend­ing all avail­able re­sources to bring per­pe­tra­tors to jus­tice.

“Any­one who has in­for­ma­tion that could be of as­sis­tance, please come for­ward, help us, so that we can stem the tide of this law­less­ness be­fore oth­er in­di­vid­u­als and fam­i­lies are af­fect­ed.”

Hare­wood-Christo­pher added: “Our an­ti-crime ini­tia­tives have been tai­lored to be fit for pur­pose to meet the chal­lenges in the re­spec­tive com­mu­ni­ties and we have been reap­ing some suc­cess­es. And while we con­tin­ue to de­ploy those ini­tia­tives, we will be reach­ing deep­er in­to com­mu­ni­ties na­tion­wide to build re­la­tion­ships and fos­ter col­lab­o­ra­tive prob­lem-solv­ing ap­proach­es that will be ef­fec­tive in pro­duc­ing the re­sults the coun­try is cry­ing out for.”

She said the TTPS will be main­tain­ing a strate­gic pres­ence in com­mu­ni­ties through its Com­mu­ni­ty Jus­tice Clin­ic ini­tia­tive as clin­ics will be spon­sored in all ten polic­ing di­vi­sions.

“I look for­ward to the im­pact of this ini­tia­tive as a means of re­duc­ing se­ri­ous crimes and mur­ders aris­ing out of fam­i­ly dis­putes, land mat­ters and in­ti­mate part­ner vi­o­lence. This is an ex­cel­lent ex­am­ple of the ben­e­fits that can be de­rived from part­ner­ships be­tween the po­lice and the pub­lic, in this case, pri­vate at­tor­neys,” she said.

The CoP said po­lice of­fi­cers will “con­tin­ue to be out front valiant­ly and tire­less­ly fight­ing the bat­tle to keep all our cit­i­zens safe. We en­cour­age all our stake­hold­ers to con­tribute to the out­come by part­ner­ing with us, and we ask every cit­i­zen to co­op­er­ate with us, as we work to­geth­er to make every place in Trinidad and To­ba­go safe.”