RHON­DOR DOWLAT-ROS­TANT

Fol­low­ing Fri­day’s al­leged shoot­ing in­ci­dent which re­sult­ed in the death of West­ern Di­vi­sion’s PC Clarence Gilkes, a group of Mus­lims cur­rent­ly par­tic­i­pat­ing in fast­ing for the month of Ra­madan, who al­leged that a group of of­fi­cers had des­e­crat­ed their makeshift mosque and threw their holy books on the ground, is call­ing on the head of the Po­lice Com­plaints Au­thor­i­ty David West to launch an in­ves­ti­ga­tion

The of­fi­cers, they al­leged, not on­ly broke up a few items but al­so walked in­to their prayer area with their boots on.

The Mus­lims are as­sur­ing the PCA that they will co­op­er­ate ful­ly with the in­ves­ti­ga­tions, as they have sev­er­al videos and pho­tographs of the al­leged abuse and de­struc­tion that oc­curred at the site.

Af­ter the al­leged shoot­ing in­ci­dent on Fri­day, a par­ty of po­lice of­fi­cers, dur­ing a search for a man they claimed shot Gilkes in the neck, went in­to a makeshift masjid where they al­leged­ly smashed a wa­ter­mel­on that the Mus­lims were go­ing to pre­pare for the break­ing of fast that evening.

Mus­lim broth­er John Brown told Guardian Me­dia that they have al­ready con­tact­ed their at­tor­ney Lemuel Mur­phy, who has sent a le­gal let­ter to act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Mc Don­ald Ja­cob on the is­sue. Mur­phy al­so asked Ja­cob to in­ves­ti­gate the claims.

“The po­lice of­fi­cers came in­to the tents with their shoes and over­turned every­thing in search of what and who we don’t know. All they said, they were look­ing for a man in con­nec­tion with the shoot­ing of the po­lice of­fi­cer. They came with no war­rant and noth­ing and rough­ing us up and telling us to go home when we are in the last ten days of Ra­mad­han and are stay­ing in the masjid un­til Eid,” Brown said dur­ing an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia.

“The of­fi­cers said they don’t care about our place of wor­ship but I know they wouldn’t have gone to oth­er places of wor­ship to do what they did. We have videos and pic­tures and are tak­ing it up with our at­tor­neys.”

Brown al­so al­leged that a group of po­lice of­fi­cers again re­turned to the com­pound short­ly af­ter 6 am on Sat­ur­day and again car­ried out search­es. He said that time, he and some oth­er broth­ers were al­leged­ly beat­en in the process.

“One of the po­lice pushed his fin­ger down my throat and then slapped me on my chest,” Brown claimed.

Brown in­sist­ed that the par­cel of land that they are cur­rent­ly oc­cu­py­ing is pri­vate­ly owned, adding that the po­lice, dur­ing the two search­es, did not pro­duce war­rants.

“We tried telling the of­fi­cers that they are on pri­vate prop­er­ty and they need to pro­duce war­rants but the po­lice of­fi­cers keep say­ing they don’t have to show any war­rants,” he said.

“The sit­u­a­tion is wors­en­ing and the po­lice of­fi­cers are tar­get­ing us for what­ev­er rea­son. For far too long they are ha­rass­ing us and provo­cat­ing us. Now they are dis­re­spect­ing us dur­ing our fast and des­e­crat­ing our masjid.”

Act­ing Com­mis­sion­er Ja­cob, in a me­dia re­lease is­sued on the mat­ter, said, “The Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice re­spects all re­li­gious groups in Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

Ja­cob not­ed that he takes the al­le­ga­tions very se­ri­ous­ly, adding of­fi­cers must re­spect all re­li­gious groups as they con­duct their du­ties. He fur­ther stat­ed that if “per­sons are ag­griev­ed be­cause of the al­leged in­ci­dent, they should re­port the mat­ter and an in­ves­ti­ga­tion will be launched in­to the al­leged in­ci­dent.”

Yes­ter­day, Brown said they are all will­ing to lodge re­ports against the po­lice of­fi­cers but added that they want an in­de­pen­dent in­ves­ti­ga­tion done by the PCA.

“As you know, we are in the last ten days of fast­ing and we can­not leave the com­pound un­til Eid but we would ap­pre­ci­ate for the PCA to come to us and we will co­op­er­ate ful­ly. We have eye­wit­ness­es ready and wait­ing to come for­ward to not on­ly speak for the mosque but for the ac­tu­al shoot­ing in­ci­dent where the po­lice of­fi­cer was killed,” Brown said.

“We heard the act­ing Com­mis­sion­er say­ing that where it hap­pened, he doubt­ed that peo­ple saw but there are videos that peo­ple took and will­ing to hand over.”