Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley has revealed plans to create specially vetted unit in the T&T Police Service (TTPS) to investigate corrupt police officers and government officials.
Delivering the feature address at a People’s National Movement (PNM) political meeting at Harris Promenade, in San Fernando, on Saturday night, Rowley said that the initiative was suggested by United States security experts during bilateral talks with that country’s government a few weeks ago.
“We have agreed to accept it, to create within our police service what we call vetted units. Vetted units, meaning groups of special police officers, men, and women, who are vetted to ensure that their integrity is intact,” Rowley said.
“Because one of the problems that we have is that there are too many criminals in the Police Service,” he added.
Rowley referred to an unnamed former police commissioner, who he said gave him (Rowley) a first-hand account of witnessing an officer tipping off a criminal about a raid.
“We have those. We have to get rid of them because they put our lives in danger. The ones that have the integrity that you want, you got to protect them,” he said.
Rowley revealed that officers selected to join these units would be compensated for performing their specialist functions.
“I am telling this country that we are prepared to pay extra to police officers in those vetted units if they will maintain their integrity and help us to root out the criminals in the police service, in the customs, in immigration, and in the Parliament,” Rowley said.
While he did not reveal more details about the planned units, he did suggest that officers would have to participate in polygraph tests on a regular basis.
Dealing with the impact of illegal firearms on crime, Rowley said that advocacy with the US Government through Caricom on the illegal firearm trade from the US led to the new laws to help prevent such activity.
“We raised that argument at high levels in the United States. The end result of that is this. Before, you could have bought a gun in one state and drive it to another state. Today, if you do that, cross a state that is now a federal crime for the first time,” Rowley said.
“And worse, if you come to the border and you export a firearm or ammunition to Trinidad and Tobago or anywhere else, that is now a federal crime,” he added.
He noted that the laws had already resulted in three people–two Trinidadians and one American– being prosecuted for attempting to export arms and ammunition to T&T.
Rowley repeatedly admitted that violent crime continues to plague the country.
“We are acknowledging like everyone else is acknowledging that violent crime is a major problem for the Government of the day but not only in this country,” he said.
“We admit that we have to face it on a daily and on an hourly basis and some of the actions of the criminals, your children, your own children, murderers you bred, our society are doing things to us that are shocking us,” he added.
Rowley said that his Government is continuing to make legislative interventions while simultaneously providing the protective services with the personnel and resources they require.
“We resourced the police service. We’re supporting the police service 100 per cent,” he said.
He noted that his party’s campaign promise in the run-up to the 2019 Local Government election to hire 1,000 municipal police officers was being fulfilled.
“We have already hired and trained and put into local government 747 municipal police. As I speak to you now, another 47 are in training and we have the last 200 coming into training in September,” Rowley said.
He maintained his position that issuing more Firearm User’s Licences (FULs) to citizens is not a viable solution to address violent crime.
“And people who saw firearms licenses as business and profit, them telling you, they are the expert in national security. And somehow, the answer is more gun and more firearm licences,” he said.
“There is a system to deal with that. But that system has been corrupted by the system itself. That system has been corrupted, I can tell you, by the police,” he said.
Rowley, National Security Minister Fitzgerald Hinds, Energy and Energy Industries Minister, and Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister Stuart Young met with Police Commissioner Erla Harewood-Christopher and T&T Police Service (TTPS) Divisional Commanders at the Diplomatic Centre, in St Ann’s, on Sunday afternoon.