Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

A prison su­per­vi­sor has firm­ly de­nied al­le­ga­tions that he pro­vid­ed as­sis­tance to a crim­i­nal gang and its leader.

Garth Gua­da, who was held un­der a de­ten­tion or­der un­der the State of Emer­gency (SoE) on Au­gust 18, is­sued the de­nial through his lawyer, Krys­tal Primus, yes­ter­day.

Primus, who last week filed for a re­view of Gua­da’s de­ten­tion or­der by the three-mem­ber SoE Re­view Tri­bunal, main­tained that her client was not in­volved in any wrong­do­ing as al­leged.

Primus said, “Every­thing that is con­tained in the de­ten­tion or­der is con­test­ed. That is hearsay and pro­pa­gan­da. They know the truth. Let them come out and tell the truth about what hap­pened at the Teteron Bar­racks.”

She claimed that her client, along with col­leagues, vis­it­ed the makeshift prison fa­cil­i­ty in Ch­aguara­mas on the in­struc­tion of then-act­ing pris­ons com­mis­sion­er Car­los Cor­raspe—who was sent on va­ca­tion leave ear­li­er this month.

“He (Gua­da) was act­ing in ac­cor­dance with his du­ty and was act­ing on or­ders,” Primus said.

She chal­lenged claims made by Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der in the de­ten­tion or­der that Gua­da at­tempt­ed to com­mu­ni­cate with in­mates at Ch­aguara­mas. She con­tend­ed that Gua­da served as a dri­ver dur­ing the brief vis­it and stayed in the ve­hi­cle, while his col­leagues, who were se­nior to him, went in­side.

“So, there is no way that the min­is­ter ex­pects us to be­lieve that Mr Gua­da went of his own vo­li­tion, walked in Teteron past all the se­cu­ri­ty that they have in place and hand­ed con­tra­band to the in­mates. That is un­be­liev­able,” the lawyer said.

Primus not­ed that while the sec­re­tary of the tri­bunal ac­knowl­edged re­ceipt of Gua­da’s re­view re­quest, a date is yet to be set for a hear­ing. She al­so not­ed that Alexan­der had not yet dis­closed fur­ther par­tic­u­lars jus­ti­fy­ing Gua­da’s con­tin­ued de­ten­tion, which is re­quired un­der the tri­bunal’s guide­lines and would be con­sid­ered at the even­tu­al hear­ing.

Af­ter re­view­ing the jus­ti­fi­ca­tion and sub­mis­sions from the de­tainee, the tri­bunal can then make rec­om­men­da­tions over the de­ten­tion or­der but does not have the ju­ris­dic­tion to com­pel its with­draw­al.

Ac­cord­ing to the de­ten­tion or­der, which was signed on Au­gust 18 and gazetted on Tues­day, Gua­da, of Mal­abar, Ari­ma, was al­leged to be an as­so­ciate of the Rad­i­cal Is­lam­ic Crim­i­nal Gang led by al­leged gang leader and mur­der ac­cused Ra­jaee Ali.

The or­der against Gua­da stat­ed: “He has been con­firmed to be pro­vid­ing sup­port to oth­er gang lead­ers and mem­bers who are in­car­cer­at­ed in fur­ther­ance of their par­tic­i­pa­tion in, in­volve­ment in or com­mis­sion of vi­o­lent gang-re­lat­ed ac­tiv­i­ties, in­clud­ing the im­mi­nent­ly planned killing of pub­lic of­fi­cials in pub­lic spaces us­ing high-pow­ered ri­fles.”

The or­der said as a prison su­per­vi­sor, Gua­da “re­peat­ed­ly fa­cil­i­tat­ed the breach of prison se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures for the ben­e­fit of the gang mem­bers and has been try­ing to en­gage in fur­ther breach­es at their cur­rent place of in­car­cer­a­tion (Teteron Bar­racks).”

Ac­cord­ing to the de­ten­tion or­der against Ali, he is ac­cused of ac­cess­ing “pro­hib­it­ed ar­ti­cles” while at the De­fence Force bases in Ch­aguara­mas.

Gua­da’s de­ten­tion or­der said this sit­u­a­tion made him a se­ri­ous threat to pub­lic safe­ty and his de­ten­tion at the East­ern Cor­rec­tion­al Re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion Cen­tre nec­es­sary, as he has shown that he has the means and re­sources “to as­sist in­car­cer­at­ed per­sons to en­gage in gang ac­tiv­i­ty de­spite their present in­car­cer­a­tion and is a threat to the safe­ty of the pub­lic.”

Ac­cord­ing to a 2023 Min­istry of Sport and Com­mu­ni­ty Af­fairs MPow­er bio on Gua­da, the 50-year-old fa­ther of one now has 29 years’ ser­vice. The bio said his ex­pe­ri­ence as a prison of­fi­cer, cou­pled with “street sense,” af­ford­ed him the op­por­tu­ni­ty to gain knowl­edge and un­der­stand­ing about the caus­es and ef­fects of crim­i­nal be­hav­iour.

Gua­da is the founder of the male men­tor­ship ini­tia­tive Project Up­lift, a pro­gramme of­fered through the reg­is­tered NGO, Panora­ma Gar­dens Im­prove­ment Com­mit­tee.

“The ini­tia­tive, ac­cord­ing to Mr Gua­da, is one he has strived over the years to cre­ate, hav­ing him­self ex­pe­ri­enced dif­fi­cult years as a male in his youth, com­ing from a sin­gle-par­ent fam­i­ly home. He ad­mits the streets par­tial­ly raised him, ex­pos­ing him to much of what crime and crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty was and still is to­day,” the bio said.

The SoE was de­clared on Ju­ly 18 on the ad­vice of Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro.

At the time, Gue­var­ro claimed that there was a crim­i­nal syn­di­cate op­er­at­ing in­side and out­side of prison with the as­sis­tance of prison of­fi­cers. Sev­er­al re­mand pris­on­ers, in­clud­ing Ali, were trans­ferred to Teteron Bar­racks and the Coast Guard’s Staubles Bay head­quar­ters on the first day of the SoE.