An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

Af­ter weeks of be­ing de­nied an au­di­ence with prison su­per­vi­sor Garth Gua­da re­gard­ing the fil­ing of a ju­di­cial re­view chal­leng­ing the State’s re­fusal to dis­con­tin­ue his Pre­ven­tive De­ten­tion Or­der (PDO), his at­tor­ney has fi­nal­ly been al­lowed to meet with him and re­ceive in­struc­tions on how to pro­ceed.

At­tor­ney Krys­tal Primus in­di­cat­ed Gua­da’s in­ten­tion to chal­lenge the re­fusal by Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der to ac­cept the de­ci­sion by the State of Emer­gency (SoE) Re­view Tri­bunal to dis­con­tin­ue his PDO on No­vem­ber 14.

How­ev­er, sev­er­al re­quests to meet with Gua­da dur­ing that time, up to ear­ly yes­ter­day, were re­peat­ed­ly de­nied by prison of­fi­cials, lead­ing Primus to be­lieve they were de­lib­er­ate­ly frus­trat­ing the time-sen­si­tive mat­ter.

Gua­da, who re­mains in­car­cer­at­ed at the Teteron Bar­racks in Ch­aguara­mas, was al­lowed to re­ceive fam­i­ly vis­its, but none with his at­tor­neys.

Guardian Me­dia was told that Gua­da con­tin­ues to be re­fused air­ing, as well as goods from the can­teen, and for fruits to be in­clud­ed with his meals.

Both Gua­da and Primus are hop­ing the court can com­pel Alexan­der, as well as the heads of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) and the T&T Prison Ser­vice (TTPrS), to dis­close the in­for­ma­tion in their pos­ses­sion, which they have claimed makes it im­per­a­tive that he re­mains be­hind bars for the time be­ing.

Un­der the SoE reg­u­la­tions, the min­is­ter can is­sue PDOs for in­di­vid­u­als deemed a threat to na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty or any­one the po­lice be­lieve is about to com­mit an act con­trary to pub­lic safe­ty.

De­tainees can, how­ev­er, chal­lenge their de­ten­tion and ask for it to be re­viewed by the SoE Re­view Tri­bunal.

Primus ap­peared be­fore the SoE Re­view Tri­bunal on Sep­tem­ber 18, dur­ing which time she pre­sent­ed ar­gu­ments for Gua­da’s re­lease, in­di­cat­ing his con­tin­ued de­ten­tion was un­law­ful and with­out mer­it.

Sub­se­quent to the re­view of the de­ten­tion or­der, the SoE Re­view Tri­bunal ac­cept­ed Gua­da’s con­tin­ued in­car­cer­a­tion was “un­nec­es­sary”, and they rec­om­mend­ed a dis­con­tin­u­a­tion of his PDO on Oc­to­ber 9.

Primus said on No­vem­ber 14 that, “The Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty has de­cid­ed not to ac­cept the rec­om­men­da­tion of the Re­view Tri­bunal and con­tin­ues to keep Mr Gua­da in pre-tri­al cus­tody, cit­ing that in­tel­li­gence from the TTPS and Prison Ser­vice in­forms his de­ci­sion, and to sum up, he dis­agrees with the Tri­bunal’s as­sess­ment.”

Gua­da, of Mal­abar in Ari­ma, is al­leged to have close links with mur­der ac­cused Ra­jaee Ali, who is al­so in­car­cer­at­ed at Teteron Bar­racks un­der a PDO.

Gua­da’s PDO, which was signed by Alexan­der on Au­gust 18, al­leges he is an as­so­ciate of the Rad­i­cal Is­lam­ic Crim­i­nal Gang sup­pos­ed­ly head­ed by Ali, as well as oth­er gangs.

It was stat­ed in Gua­da’s PDO that, “He has been con­firmed to be pro­vid­ing sup­port to oth­er gang lead­ers and mem­bers who are in­car­cer­at­ed in fur­ther­ance of their par­tic­i­pa­tion in, in­volve­ment in or com­mis­sion of vi­o­lent gang-re­lat­ed ac­tiv­i­ties, in­clud­ing the im­mi­nent­ly planned killing of pub­lic of­fi­cials in pub­lic spaces us­ing high-pow­ered ri­fles.”

The PDO fur­ther stat­ed that Gua­da “re­peat­ed­ly fa­cil­i­tat­ed the breach of prison se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures for the ben­e­fit of the gang mem­bers and has been try­ing to en­gage in fur­ther breach­es at their cur­rent place of in­car­cer­a­tion (Teteron Bar­racks).”