Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

For­mer po­lice com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith will have to wait just over five months to learn the out­come of his law­suit against for­mer Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PolSC) chair­man Bliss Seep­er­sad over her con­tro­ver­sial de­ci­sion to with­draw a mer­it list dur­ing his bid for reap­point­ment in 2021.

High Court judge Kevin Ram­cha­ran re­served his de­ci­sion un­til Ju­ly 6 af­ter pre­sid­ing over the tri­al at the Wa­ter­front Ju­di­cial Com­plex in Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day.

In the law­suit, Grif­fith con­tends that Seep­er­sad act­ed un­con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly and un­law­ful­ly when she with­drew the mer­it list short­ly af­ter sub­mit­ting it to then pres­i­dent Paula-Mae Weekes on Au­gust 11, 2021. The list had ranked Grif­fith as the top can­di­date for reap­point­ment as Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice.

He is al­so chal­leng­ing Seep­er­sad’s de­ci­sion to place him off du­ty af­ter his three-year term ex­pired, while the com­mis­sion was de­lib­er­at­ing on whether to reap­point him or se­lect a new com­mis­sion­er. Grif­fith main­tains that he was sus­pend­ed rather than placed on ad­min­is­tra­tive leave, and that the ac­tion dam­aged his pro­fes­sion­al rep­u­ta­tion.

While un­der cross-ex­am­i­na­tion by se­nior coun­sel Deb­o­rah Peake, Grif­fith claimed Seep­er­sad was im­prop­er­ly in­flu­enced by for­mer prime min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley fol­low­ing a meet­ing held short­ly af­ter the mer­it list was sub­mit­ted. Row­ley, in his ca­pac­i­ty as head of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil (NSC), ref­er­enced an in­ves­tiga­tive re­port in­to the op­er­a­tions of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) Firearms Unit.

“I think she wilt­ed un­der pres­sure af­ter be­ing bul­lied by the Prime Min­is­ter,” Grif­fith said.

Grif­fith was ques­tioned ex­ten­sive­ly about the NSC re­port, pre­pared by for­mer Spe­cial Branch head Arthur Bar­ring­ton and for­mer chief of de­fence staff Hay­den Pritchard. He main­tained that he was nev­er ac­cused of wrong­do­ing in the re­port, though he ac­knowl­edged hav­ing fi­nal ap­proval over firearm user’s li­cence (FUL) ap­pli­ca­tions and firearms im­port per­mits.

He fur­ther stat­ed that he was nev­er iden­ti­fied as a sus­pect in a sep­a­rate probe led by for­mer judge Stan­ley John, which was ini­ti­at­ed by the PolSC, and re­peat­ed­ly em­pha­sised that he was nev­er charged with any crim­i­nal of­fence de­spite mul­ti­ple in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

Grif­fith dis­put­ed sev­er­al al­le­ga­tions in the re­port con­cern­ing FUL vari­ances and firearms and am­mu­ni­tion im­ports, say­ing ap­provals flagged in the re­port re­lat­ed to items in­tend­ed for the TTPS and the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force.

Asked whether he be­lieved Par­lia­ment would have ap­proved a sec­ond term for him had the mer­it list not been with­drawn, de­spite Row­ley’s con­cerns, Grif­fith re­spond­ed: “It may have been ap­proved. I don’t know.”

Grif­fith said the con­tro­ver­sy se­vere­ly af­fect­ed his pro­fes­sion­al stand­ing.

“I have nev­er been able to catch my­self be­cause of the sus­pen­sion, which was un­fair to me,” he said.

Grif­fith’s sole wit­ness was Nicoleen Tay­lor-Chin­chamee, a for­mer lo­cal gov­ern­ment and gen­er­al elec­tion can­di­date for his po­lit­i­cal par­ty, the Na­tion­al Trans­for­ma­tion Al­liance (NTA). She tes­ti­fied that, based on the events sur­round­ing the mat­ter, she con­tin­ued to hold Grif­fith in high re­gard as Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice.

In her ev­i­dence, Seep­er­sad said the meet­ing with Row­ley was arranged at the re­quest of then pres­i­dent Weekes.

Seep­er­sad ad­mit­ted there was no ex­press con­sti­tu­tion­al pro­vi­sion al­low­ing for the with­draw­al of a mer­it list once sub­mit­ted, but de­nied that she had “re­voked” it. Re­spond­ing to claims by Grif­fith’s at­tor­ney, Lar­ry Lal­la, that she act­ed uni­lat­er­al­ly, Seep­er­sad said: “I was the on­ly mem­ber present.”

She de­nied that the list was with­drawn im­me­di­ate­ly fol­low­ing her meet­ing with Row­ley, stat­ing that the dis­cus­sion last­ed ap­prox­i­mate­ly 90 min­utes. She al­so ac­knowl­edged that she was not shown the NSC re­port be­fore the with­draw­al and that it was on­ly sent to her days lat­er.

Seep­er­sad fur­ther ad­mit­ted that she did not ask Row­ley for de­tails about the re­port, in­clud­ing when it was pre­pared, who com­mis­sioned it, or whether it had been re­ferred to the Of­fice of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions, the Po­lice Com­plaints Au­thor­i­ty or the TTPS.

She main­tained that Grif­fith was placed on ad­min­is­tra­tive leave, not sus­pend­ed, due to the se­ri­ous­ness of the al­le­ga­tions and a par­al­lel in­ves­ti­ga­tion ini­ti­at­ed by the PolSC.

“He was asked not to re­port for du­ty,” she said.

Seep­er­sad was al­so ques­tioned about a res­ig­na­tion let­ter sub­mit­ted by for­mer PolSC mem­ber Roger Kawals­ingh fol­low­ing the con­tro­ver­sy. In the cor­re­spon­dence, Kawals­ingh cit­ed uni­lat­er­al de­ci­sion-mak­ing by Seep­er­sad and al­leged im­prop­er com­mu­ni­ca­tion be­tween her and John.

Re­spond­ing to those al­le­ga­tions, Seep­er­sad said: “He might be mis­tak­en, but he would not tell un­truths.”

Through the law­suit, Grif­fith is seek­ing com­pen­sa­tion for dam­age to his rep­u­ta­tion and loss of op­por­tu­ni­ty to be ap­point­ed Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice for a fur­ther three-year term.