Jensen La Vende

Act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Stephen Williams says while he in­tends to as­sem­ble the largest team in the coun­try's his­to­ry to in­ves­ti­gate the killing of Dana See­ta­hal, SC, he has not re­quest­ed any re­gion­al or in­ter­na­tion­al as­sis­tance just yet.He made the com­ment yes­ter­day as po­lice con­tin­ued their probe in­to the mat­ter and hunt for sus­pect/s in the case.

Williams said the Po­lice Ser­vice was con­duct­ing an open in­ves­ti­ga­tion and had not ruled out any pos­si­ble link in the mur­der of See­ta­hal, who was gunned down ear­ly Sun­day morn­ing in Wood­brook.The killing of such a high-pro­file se­nior at­tor­ney and state pros­e­cu­tor has sent shock­waves through the le­gal fra­ter­ni­ty, with many state at­tor­neys re­port­ed­ly now liv­ing in fear that they could be pos­si­ble tar­gets, the T&T Guardian un­der­stands.

Asked whether the po­lice were work­ing on the the­o­ry that a hit was or­dered from be­hind prison walls, Williams said all pos­si­ble leads were be­ing pur­sued.He re­it­er­at­ed that the largest team in T&T's his­to­ry had been as­sem­bled to in­ves­ti­gate the mur­der and that mem­bers of this team were be­ing pulled from out­side of the Homi­cide Bu­reau as well.The lead in­ves­ti­ga­tor in the case, ACP Wayne Dick, was locked in talks with his main team mem­bers for most of yes­ter­day the T&T Guardian un­der­stands.

Williams al­so de­nied re­ports that 15 spent shells were found at the crime scene but did not give an­oth­er num­ber. He al­so said he would not be com­ment­ing on the cal­i­bre of weapon used in the at­tack. "I am not go­ing to in­ves­ti­gate this mat­ter in the me­dia," Williams said, adding that when there was an up­date the me­dia would be in­formed.How­ev­er, the au­top­sy re­vealed that See­ta­hal was shot five times at close range with a medi­um cal­i­bre hand­gun and not a high-pow­ered ri­fle as was ini­tial­ly re­port­ed.

Yes­ter­day, how­ev­er, Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Gary Grif­fith said the Unit­ed States stood ready to of­fer as­sis­tance if need­ed in the case. But Grif­fith too ad­mit­ted that he did not think that was nec­es­sary at this stage of the case.

The at­tack

Short­ly be­fore mid­night last Sat­ur­day, See­ta­hal left the Ma Pau casi­no car park on French Street, Port-of-Spain, on her way to her One Wood­brook Place apart­ment. She drove south down French Street be­fore turn­ing west on­to Wright­son Road and lat­er turn­ing north on­to Hamil­ton Hold­er Street, Wood­brook.Po­lice said as she ap­proached the Wood­brook Youth Fa­cil­i­ty, she was am­bushed and shot five times, twice in the head, twice in the right fore­arm and once in the chest.

A $3.5 mil­lion re­ward is be­ing of­fered for in­for­ma­tion which leads to the cap­ture and pros­e­cu­tion of the in­di­vid­ual/s in­volved in the mur­der.CrimeStop­pers had ini­tial­ly of­fered $1 mil­lion be­fore Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar upped it by $2.5 mil­lion, adding Gov­ern­ment was al­so pre­pared to give Williams any as­sis­tance his men would need.See­ta­hal's fu­ner­al takes place to­mor­row at the Ara­malaya Pres­by­ter­ian Church, Tu­na­puna, from5 pm.