Emotions were high among security officers in Woodford Square, Port-of-Spain, on Tuesday as they counted the minutes, to the exact hour, of the one-year anniversary of the murders of their colleagues Jeffrey Peters and Jerry Stuart.
On September 19, 2022, three Allied Security officers conducted a cash-in-transit operation at Pennywise Plaza in La Romain.
As they were about to leave, five bandits armed with high-powered guns ambushed them and killed Peters and Stuart.
A third officer, Peola Baptiste, survived. Yesterday, she told the rally that the last year has not been easy.
“I am scarred mentally and physically and every time I think about the last moments with my two colleagues and best friends it’s hard to move on, it’s really hard,” Baptiste said.
But as they mourned, there were calls for the Industrial Court to “flex its muscles on employers” and for the owners of security companies to get their act together.
From 2002 to this year, a total of 23 security officers have been killed, they revealed yesterday during the rally.
President of the Estate Police Association (EPA) Deryck Richardson said that the company Baptiste and the others worked for has done nothing for any of the affected families.
“Three children left behind, seven, four, and six months. Jerry first grandchild he will never see,” he said.
“When we contacted them and said how you going and treat with the families, crickets nothing, nothing, up to this day they haven’t met with Amanda, they haven’t met with Peola, they haven’t met with the Stuart family. You think the pain of their brother doing down in this hail of bullets, you think that will go away? But no, you are not good enough to engage in a discussion of how do we help,” Richardson claimed.
In August this year, a security officer from Telecom Security Services was shot and killed by bandits in Chin Chin Road, Cunupia.
It was for that reason Richardson called on security officers and their families to boycott MovieTowne which is owned by Derek Chin. Chin also owns Telecom Security Services.
“We are calling on all estate police, whether you could afford or you waiting until you get backpay to go, do not go to MovieTowne do not spend a single cent, not a single cent of your money must be spent on Derek Chin, and his company,” he said.
Another reason for the boycott was the work environment at the security firm. One employee told the rally about his experience there.
“The owners of Telecom don’t care about officers. They giving you derelict firearms to use where the magazines falling out, the safety falling out, the gun not chambering. They giving you vest that is older than my daughter who is 19 years ... these vests and them old but they have no trauma plate, and they not stab resistance so a bandit doh need a gun to kill you he could walk up to you and chook you with an ice pick, chook you with a blade and you fall down,” he claimed.
In a response, Chin told Guardian Media yesterday that no employer wants to lose an employee. But he said the problem was the crime situation in this country.
Chin added that if the criminals are not stopped it would not matter if he gave his workers tanks or a bazooka.
