Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro says in­tel­li­gence point­ing to an or­gan­ised crime syn­di­cate prepar­ing to car­ry out rob­beries, kid­nap­pings, and as­sas­si­na­tions led to the de­c­la­ra­tion of a State of Emer­gency at 12.02 a.m. to­day.

Speak­ing dur­ing an emer­gency press brief­ing at the Po­lice Ad­min­is­tra­tion Build­ing in Port of Spain, Gue­var­ro said the syn­di­cate had been plan­ning co­or­di­nat­ed at­tacks on gov­ern­ment, ju­di­cial, and law en­force­ment of­fi­cials.

He re­vealed that he had vis­it­ed the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison in Arou­ca, where he per­son­al­ly su­per­vised the ex­trac­tion of sev­er­al gang lead­ers to un­named se­cu­ri­ty fa­cil­i­ties.

Gue­var­ro said the op­er­a­tion was nec­es­sary to dis­rupt the syn­di­cate’s plans and safe­guard na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty.