KEVON FELMINE

De­spite as­sur­ances from Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der that an ar­rest was im­mi­nent, fear con­tin­ues to grip staff at Rio Claro East Sec­ondary School, as po­lice con­firm no sus­pect has yet been de­tained or ques­tioned in con­nec­tion with vi­o­lent threats made against teach­ers, stu­dent and their fam­i­lies.

The threats first sur­faced in No­vem­ber, when mes­sages cir­cu­lat­ed on­line ac­cus­ing teach­ers of racist be­hav­iour. In Jan­u­ary, ad­di­tion­al mes­sages ap­peared on plat­forms in­clud­ing What­sApp and Tik­Tok. One post re­port­ed­ly in­clud­ed a pho­to­graph of a firearm and threat­ened harm to teach­ers’ fam­i­lies, while oth­ers ref­er­enced an im­pend­ing at­tack and a teacher’s ve­hi­cle.

East­ern Di­vi­sion po­lice said yes­ter­day the mat­ter re­mains un­der ac­tive in­ves­ti­ga­tion, but ac­knowl­edged that no sus­pect has been ap­proached.

Dur­ing a vis­it to the school on Jan­u­ary 20, Alexan­der said po­lice had been pur­su­ing the mat­ter since the first re­port. He added that the Po­lice Cy­ber Crime Unit was man­ag­ing the in­ves­ti­ga­tion with as­sis­tance from in­ter­na­tion­al part­ners.

“We are con­fi­dent that the in­ves­ti­ga­tion is pro­gress­ing, and an ar­rest will be made in the near fu­ture. We will not take any threat light­ly. Our re­spon­si­bil­i­ty is to en­sure that every­one feels safe,” Alexan­der said.

How­ev­er, T&T Uni­fied Teach­ers As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) pres­i­dent Crys­tal Bevin Ashe said the pres­ence of a po­lice of­fi­cer at the school has done lit­tle to calm staff fears.

“As we spoke to the teach­ers, noth­ing has changed be­cause no­body has been ap­pre­hend­ed or held cul­pa­ble,” Ashe said.

“Some teach­ers’ chil­dren were named. Ve­hi­cle num­bers and home ad­dress­es were ex­posed. Stu­dents were al­so threat­ened.”

Ashe not­ed that while Alexan­der had as­sured teach­ers an ar­rest was im­mi­nent, that as­sur­ance came more than ten days ago.

He, along with sec­ond vice pres­i­dent Nigel Fi­garo and TTUTA in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions of­fi­cers, vis­it­ed the school yes­ter­day to meet staff and as­sess the sit­u­a­tion. Ashe said the meet­ing aimed to de­ter­mine how the as­so­ci­a­tion could sup­port teach­ers “in a cor­dial and pro­duc­tive way.”

“We look for­ward to con­tin­u­ing to work with teach­ers and law en­force­ment to see how best this mat­ter can be ad­dressed and re­solved as soon as pos­si­ble,” he said.

Ashe added that while Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Michael Dowlath and Alexan­der had vis­it­ed the school to gath­er in­for­ma­tion, TTUTA has not been briefed on the de­tails.

“All we know is what the teach­ers have told us. They were asked per­ti­nent ques­tions re­lat­ing to what­ev­er in­ves­ti­ga­tions are be­ing car­ried out,” he said.

TTUTA plans to reach out to po­lice to see if it can as­sist and has ad­vised teach­ers to sub­mit writ­ten com­plaints to the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion if they feel un­safe.

A se­nior East­ern Di­vi­sion of­fi­cer con­firmed that po­lice have not ap­proached a sus­pect but said of­fi­cers re­main sta­tioned at the school dur­ing teach­ing hours.

“We are aware of the sit­u­a­tion and are try­ing to se­cure the school as much as pos­si­ble based on the risk posed by so­cial me­dia posts,” the of­fi­cer said. “We main­tain reg­u­lar pa­trols and li­aise with the prin­ci­pal and dean to mon­i­tor the sit­u­a­tion.”