Fol­low­ing her ar­rest and re­lease from law­ful cus­tody at the week­end, the fu­ture of this coun­try’s Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher re­mains un­cer­tain.

Up to late yes­ter­day evening, there was no word from ei­ther the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice or the com­mis­sion­er her­self on whether or not she will be in of­fice to­day at the Po­lice Ad­min­is­tra­tion Build­ing in Port-of-Spain.

On Sat­ur­day, Hare­wood-Christo­pher walked out of the St Clair Po­lice Sta­tion fol­low­ing her ar­rest on Thurs­day in con­nec­tion with an on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency and the pro­cure­ment of two high-pow­ered sniper ri­fles. De­spite be­ing held for 48-hours, the Com­mis­sion­er was not charged.

Yes­ter­day, sev­er­al calls to Hare­wood-Christo­pher about her next step and whether she will be re­sum­ing du­ties as the lead of the TTPS went unan­swered.

What­sApp mes­sages sent did not go through.

Calls to her at­tor­ney, Se­nior Coun­sel Pamela El­der did not yield any in­for­ma­tion as El­der told Guardian Me­dia that she had not spo­ken to her client for the day and lat­er said “Sun­day was a rest day.”

Asked by re­porters on Sat­ur­day out­side the po­lice sta­tion whether or not the CoP would be re­turn­ing to work as nor­mal to­day, El­der had ear­li­er told re­porters, “That would have to be dis­cussed. We have to put pen to pa­per.”

In the mean­time, the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion did not shed any light on the sit­u­a­tion ei­ther as calls to chair­man Dr Wen­dell Wal­lace went unan­swered, yes­ter­day.

How­ev­er, a source in the TTPS said that based on in­for­ma­tion they were re­ceiv­ing it was high­ly un­like­ly that Hare­wood-Christo­pher would re­sume du­ties as Com­mis­sion­er to­day. But the source quick­ly added they would know for sure come Mon­day morn­ing.

Ef­forts to con­tact the Po­lice So­cial Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent As­sis­tant Su­per­in­ten­dent Gideon Dick­son al­so proved fu­tile.

In a What­sApp ex­change with Guardian Me­dia on Sat­ur­day, Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Suzette Mar­tin was asked di­rect­ly;” Now that the CoP has been re­leased with­out charge, does she re­vert back to CoP du­ties?”

Mar­tin re­spond­ed, “No.”

The DCP was asked to ex­plain but there was no fur­ther re­sponse.

How­ev­er in a me­dia re­lease yes­ter­day, the TTPS sought to dis­tance it­self from that state­ment.

“The TTPS wish­es to state that DCP Mar­tin made no such state­ments and would not be in a po­si­tion to make any com­ments on the tenure of the CoP. As such, that re­port is er­ro­neous”, the me­dia re­lease said.

While the fu­ture of Hare­wood-Christo­pher as leader of the po­lice ser­vice re­mains un­clear, a se­nior po­lice of­fi­cial said her re­lease from cus­tody was not the end of the months-long in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

In a brief in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Mar­tin is­sued a spe­cial ap­peal to the pub­lic, “To re­frain from sen­sa­tion­al­is­ing the mat­ter and spread­ing mis­in­for­ma­tion and spec­u­la­tion.”

She as­sured, “The TTPS will con­tin­ue the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in the most trans­par­ent, ac­count­able and im­par­tial man­ner as we have been do­ing all along.”

Mar­tin con­firmed the in­ves­ti­ga­tion con­tin­ues with of­fi­cials work­ing dili­gent­ly.

Ac­knowl­edg­ing the pub­lic’s in­ter­est in this mat­ter, the DCP said they would pro­vide up­dates where and when pos­si­ble, and which would not com­pro­mise the in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

The TTPS, in its state­ment, called for pa­tience from the pub­lic and urged cau­tion when it comes to spec­u­la­tion.

“The in­ves­ti­ga­tions are be­ing han­dled with the ut­most pro­fes­sion­al­ism, trans­paren­cy and im­par­tial­i­ty and jus­tice must be based on facts and due process, rather than as­sump­tions or bi­ased nar­ra­tives. Pre­ma­ture con­clu­sions and false in­for­ma­tion can cre­ate un­nec­es­sary ten­sion and hin­der the work of in­ves­ti­ga­tors.

“I give the as­sur­ance that the in­ves­ti­ga­tion, which has been guid­ed all along by the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions, is be­ing treat­ed with the ut­most se­ri­ous­ness and all find­ings will be based on cred­i­ble ev­i­dence. Let us all ex­er­cise re­spon­si­bil­i­ty by al­low­ing the in­ves­ti­ga­tion to un­fold with­out in­ter­fer­ence, as I call on every­one to up­hold fair­ness, trust the le­gal sys­tem, and re­frain from sen­sa­tion­al­is­ing the case. Let us await the facts, be­fore form­ing opin­ions.”

‘Erod­ing con­fi­dence’

Mean­while, the As­so­ci­a­tion of Cen­tral Le­gal Prac­ti­tion­ers (ACLP) through its chair­man, at­tor­ney Kiel Tak­lals­ingh has ex­pressed con­cern over the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the CoP.

De­mand­ing ac­count­abil­i­ty, the ACLP said it was deeply con­cerned as, “This im­broglio will in­evitably erode pub­lic con­fi­dence in that of­fice.”

The ACLP said, “The con­duct of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice should be re­viewed to de­ter­mine whether due process was ob­served and re­mained free from bias or un­fair­ness, there­by up­hold­ing the in­sti­tu­tion­al in­tegri­ty of the TTPS.”