Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

A quin­tes­sen­tial role mod­el of what a po­lice of­fi­cer should be. 

This is how Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Ju­nior Ben­jamin de­scribed Se­nior Su­per­in­ten­dent Neil Bran­don-John dur­ing his fu­ner­al ser­vice yes­ter­day at Our La­dy of Per­pet­u­al Help Church in San Fer­nan­do. 

Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher, oth­er mem­bers of the hi­er­ar­chy of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) first and sec­ond di­vi­sions and re­tired of­fi­cers were among those who paid their fi­nal re­spects.

Bran­don-John, who served in the TTPS for 34 years in var­i­ous di­vi­sions and units in the po­lice ser­vice, was pro­mot­ed to Se­nior Su­per­in­ten­dent in De­cem­ber 2022 and served as act­ing Act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice for the last sev­en months. He passed away from nat­ur­al caus­es on Sep­tem­ber 23 at the age of 53.

Not­ing that Bran­don-John served with dis­tinc­tion, Ben­jamin de­scribed him as a rich and pow­er­ful man due to his vast ex­pe­ri­ence.

He re­ceived 23 com­men­da­tions for painstak­ing in­quiries, de­tec­tion of firearms and ded­i­ca­tion to du­ty, among oth­er fields.

One of his col­leagues re­called that he was “a charge man” who loved to test leg­is­la­tion to de­ter­mine if it was good or bad law. He said one of Bran­don-John’s col­leagues re­flect­ed that he had once charged a gov­ern­ment min­is­ter and won the mat­ter. He said, “He was fear­less, ex­cel­lent in the courts, al­ways lov­ing to share new leg­is­la­tion and get­ting of­fi­cers to read new laws.”

Ben­jamin added that he went be­yond the badge and men­tored young of­fi­cers.

Not­ing that he loved the TTPS, his coun­try, and his fam­i­ly, Ben­jamin said, “He is a quin­tes­sen­tial role mod­el of what a po­lice of­fi­cer should be. He demon­strat­ed true lead­er­ship and is ground­ed in hu­mil­i­ty and ser­vice. As we re­flect on the life and lega­cy of this great crime fight­er Bran­don-John, let us re­mem­ber as in­di­vid­u­als that he had an un­wa­ver­ing com­mit­ment to jus­tice. His courage for crime fight­ing in the face of ad­ver­si­ty should not be for­got­ten.”

He was eu­lo­gised by his on­ly child, She­niel Bran­don-John, who said her fa­ther was charis­mat­ic and dy­nam­ic. Boast­ing that he was the best po­lice of­fi­cer in the coun­try, she said he was well re­spect­ed among his col­leagues and in every di­vi­sion he worked.

She said while her fa­ther ce­ment­ed him­self as a ded­i­cat­ed and wise of­fi­cer with a calm de­meanour, he could “han­dle any­thing.”

She said polic­ing was sec­ond to his love for gar­den­ing and he al­so en­joyed fish­ing, hunt­ing and oth­er out­door ac­tiv­i­ties. He loved his fam­i­ly and want­ed the “ab­solute best in every­thing for me,” She­niel said.

Fa­ther David Khan, who of­fi­ci­at­ed at the ser­vice, en­cour­aged peo­ple, in­clud­ing the mem­bers of the TTPS, to let change be­gin with them. He said Bran­don-John want­ed a bet­ter T&T and that change be­gan with him.

“It is easy to blame oth­ers for your down­fall, but we need to ask our­selves, are we lift­ing our­selves and oth­ers? Are we go­ing to be part of the prob­lem or are we go­ing to be part of the so­lu­tion?” He said peo­ple need to be good and just and work to­geth­er to achieve change.

Hare­wood-Christo­pher, oth­er mem­bers of the hi­er­ar­chy of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) first and sec­ond di­vi­sions and re­tired of­fi­cers were among those who paid their fi­nal re­spects.

Bran­don-John was cre­mat­ed by JE Guide Fu­ner­al Home and Cre­ma­to­ri­um in San Fer­nan­do.