An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

Ques­tions are now be­ing raised about why mem­bers of the T&T Fire Ser­vices (TTFS) al­lowed Gov­ern­ment min­is­ters to ac­cess the burnt-out ru­ins of the late Lisa Mor­ris-Ju­lian's home on Mon­day, fol­low­ing the fire that claimed the lives of the min­is­ter and her two chil­dren.

There are now con­cerns that al­low­ing this ac­cess may have com­pro­mised foren­sic ev­i­dence at the site, which re­mains a crime scene un­til both fire and TTPS of­fi­cials com­plete their in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to the cause of the blaze.

Mem­bers of the pub­lic ini­tial­ly took to so­cial me­dia to ex­press their out­rage at the oc­curence hours af­ter the fire claimed the lives of D’Abadie/O’Meara MP Mor­ris-Ju­lian and her chil­dren Je­si­ah Mor­ris-Ju­lian, six; and Xi­anne Mor­ris-Ju­lian, 25. The three were burnt to death in the fire which gut­ted their home at Far­fan Street around 5.30 am.

Among some of the min­is­ters who were al­lowed ac­cess to the prop­er­ty were En­er­gy Min­is­ter Stu­art Young; Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les; Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds; Plan­ning Min­is­ter Pen­ny Beck­les and Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly

Con­tact­ed on the is­sue yes­ter­day, a se­nior TTFS of­fi­cial was un­able to say why a se­lect group of min­is­ters were al­lowed in­to the premis­es.

While he de­clined to spec­u­late on the is­sue, the se­nior of­fi­cer ad­mit­ted, “I have no idea why they were al­lowed in the area. It should not have been and they were asked to leave that area.”

Mean­while, se­nior T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) of­fi­cials were al­so stumped by the move, as they too agreed such ac­tions could have com­pro­mised the ev­i­dence, as the scene had not yet been cleared by foren­sic an­a­lysts.

Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands the in­ves­ti­ga­tion to de­ter­mine the ex­act cause of the blaze is still on­go­ing and it is hoped this would be com­plet­ed by to­day.

Equal­ly up­set over the num­ber of per­sons al­lowed ac­cess to the crime scene, the po­lice ex­plained there were two lev­els of cor­don­ing – in­ner and out­er – usu­al­ly ac­ti­vat­ed at any crime scene, in­clud­ing fires, ac­ci­dents and homi­cides. This, they ad­vised, was to en­sure the preser­va­tion of the crime scene and en­sure there is no con­t­a­m­i­na­tion of ev­i­dence which can help in­ves­ti­ga­tors make ex­act de­ter­mi­na­tions lat­er on.

Mem­bers of the pub­lic took to Face­book af­ter im­ages of the Gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials ac­cess­ing the prop­er sur­faced on­line.

Blues­tar Lms ques­tioned on FB, “What is he do­ing there? The build­ing is a haz­ardous site, on­ly fire of­fi­cers should be in there un­til deemed fit for re-en­try, then in­ves­ti­ga­tor can do their jobs. If a crime was com­mit­ted, not say­ing one was, but the way things are in this coun­try you nev­er know. He has con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed the scene. I guess he treat­ed this as yet an­oth­er pho­to opt.”

Ma­hase Koonj Be­har­ry lament­ed, “No one will know the truth now.....Min­is­ter of every­thing…”

Fol­low­ing Mon­day’s tragedy, Mor­ris-Ju­lian’s hus­band Daniel, 49, un­der­went emer­gency surgery af­ter sus­tain­ing se­vere burns about the body and re­mained hos­pi­talised at the In­ten­sive Care Unit of the Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex, Mt Hope, yes­ter­day.

Four oth­er per­sons who were in­jured dur­ing the in­ci­dent were treat­ed and dis­charged from hos­pi­tal yes­ter­day.

Mor­ris-Ju­lian’s re­main­ing chil­dren, aged 39, 22 and 17; along with a male fam­i­ly friend, aged 23; were the oth­er vic­tims who man­aged to es­cape the burn­ing struc­ture.