As DCP In­tel­li­gence and In­ves­ti­ga­tions Suzette Mar­tin re­mains on ac­tive du­ty up to yes­ter­day, for­mer chair­man of the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PolSC) Pro­fes­sor Ramesh De­osaran is urg­ing the com­mis­sion’s cur­rent ex­ec­u­tive to pub­licly ad­dress the mat­ter.

On Mon­day, Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro an­nounced that an in­ves­ti­ga­tion was ini­ti­at­ed in­to al­le­ga­tions of crim­i­nal con­duct on the part of Mar­tin for her ar­rest of firearms deal­er and train­er Brent Thomas from Bar­ba­dos in Oc­to­ber 2022.

Ques­tions over whether prop­er pro­to­cols were fol­lowed in Thomas’ ar­rest arose when the mat­ter was brought be­fore High Court Judge Jus­tice De­ven­dra Ram­per­sad one year lat­er, who de­scribed the ar­rest as an “ab­duc­tion.”

On Tues­day, Gue­var­ro con­firmed that Mar­tin re­mained on ac­tive du­ty and sug­gest­ed that any ques­tions over her pos­si­ble sus­pen­sion be di­rect­ed to the PolSC as that was the on­ly body re­spon­si­ble for the sus­pen­sion of of­fi­cers.

Guardian Me­dia emailed ques­tions to the com­mis­sion’s cor­po­rate com­mu­ni­ca­tions unit but up to yes­ter­day, there was not even an ac­knowl­edge­ment of re­ceipt. Sev­er­al phone calls to the PolSC’s chair Dr Wen­dell Wal­lace al­so went unan­swered.

How­ev­er, De­osaran said the com­mis­sion had a re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to speak on the mat­ter as the in­ves­ti­ga­tion is al­ready in the pub­lic do­main.

“At least they should say it (sus­pen­sion) is be­ing con­sid­ered since there is an ac­tive in­ves­ti­ga­tion against Mar­tin.

“While a per­son is in­no­cent un­til proven guilty, pub­lic con­fi­dence is not pa­tient.”

In Feb­ru­ary, for­mer po­lice com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher was ar­rest­ed by of­fi­cers fol­low­ing an in­ves­ti­ga­tion - led by Mar­tin - over the unau­tho­rised trans­fer of two bolt-ac­tion sniper ri­fles from the TTPS to the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency (SSA).

She was sus­pend­ed by the PolSC just days lat­er.

Hare­wood-Christo­pher was re­leased from cus­tody and the DPP lat­er dis­con­tin­ued the mat­ter.

Hare­wood-Christo­pher lat­er sought le­gal re­dress, chal­leng­ing the le­gal­i­ty of her sus­pen­sion from the TTPS.

How­ev­er, High Court Judge Christo­pher Sieuchan up­held that her re­moval was “law­ful, in pub­lic in­ter­est and not against the laws of nat­ur­al jus­tice.”

De­osaran re­ferred to this rul­ing and urged the PolSC to fol­low the judg­ment and rea­son­ing as they con­sid­er their op­tions in sus­pend­ing Mar­tin.

He al­so ref­er­enced Hare­wood-Christo­pher’s ar­rest and hoped that the TTPS did its part to en­sure due process was fol­lowed.

“Giv­en the fi­as­co over the Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher case, the in­ves­ti­ga­tion by ACP Curt Si­mon should be very thor­ough and re­li­able enough for the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tion’s (DPP) as­sess­ment.

“The Po­lice Ser­vice should not en­dure an­oth­er con­fu­sion over ev­i­dence-gath­er­ing against their very se­nior of­fi­cers.”

He al­so sug­gest­ed that Com­mis­sion­er Gue­var­ro en­sure the probe is con­duct­ed in an ef­fi­cient and time­ly man­ner with the “high­est stan­dards” and with­out caus­ing un­nec­es­sary em­bar­rass­ment.1