Di­rec­tor of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Op­er­a­tions Cen­tre Garvin Heer­ah re­port­ed­ly re­turned to the coun­try yes­ter­day. How­ev­er, the T&T Guardian was un­able to con­tact him at his of­fice yes­ter­day for com­ment on the Fly­ing Squad is­sue.

When a T&T Guardian team vis­it­ed his of­fice at River­side Plaza, Port-of-Spain, yes­ter­day, staff of­fered con­flict­ing state­ments on his where­abouts.Af­ter be­ing in­formed of the name of the me­dia house, an of­fi­cial told the T&T Guardian: "We thought he was in the of­fice but were told he left to at­tend a meet­ing at the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty."

An­oth­er of­fi­cial said: "Mr Heer­ah has not re­turned to T&T."In­ter­nal e-mails from the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty showed Heer­ah was aware that premis­es were be­ing sought last year for the New Fly­ing Squad In­ves­ti­ga­tion Unit.

Eight ve­hi­cles for the unit were leased from Mis­cel­la­neous Mar­ket­ing Ltd, El So­cor­ro, af­ter Heer­ah gave the go-ahead. Heer­ah an­swers to the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty which is head­ed by Jack Warn­er.

Warn­er said Heer­ah was ex­pect­ed to re­turn to the coun­try over the week­end and was due to sub­mit a re­port on the squad in 24 hours.E-mails showed the min­istry's ac­coun­tant, Rocky Pacheco, was al­so in con­tact with mem­bers of the NF­SIU. Re­tired po­lice in­spec­tor Mervyn Cord­ner has re­peat­ed­ly claimed Warn­er re­called him to head the unit.

Warn­er, how­ev­er, has de­nied any knowl­edge of the NF­SIU and said those cul­pa­ble would be "dealt with."Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, who is head of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil, and who last year left it up to Warn­er whether the unit would be set up, has or­dered him to sub­mit a re­port fol­low­ing the rev­e­la­tions.

The unit, which has to be sanc­tioned by the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (CoP), op­er­at­ed out­side the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice.The act­ing CoP has al­so said he was un­aware of the NF­SIU un­til he read the T&T Guardian sto­ry that ex­posed its il­le­gal set­ting-up.