Acting Commissioner of Police McDonald Jacob has cleared the air on allegations made by former minister of agriculture Clarence Rambharat that he has a file in the Police Service, where he (Rambharat)reported that a senior official in the ministry worked with a senior officer in State Lands to grant five relatives of the senior officer seven lots of state lands valued at a minimum $5 million.
Speaking during a media briefing launching the new National Operations Task Force on Thursday, Jacob said two people were arrested and taken before the court. He said he has a letter from Rambharat thanking the TTPS for the way the investigation was done.
“There are also other investigations ongoing but two already charged and brought before the courts,” Jacob said during the launch at the Inter-Agency Task Force headquarters in Aranguez.
Asked about the Firearms Section and whether its operations, including the issuing of firearm users licenses, were still halted, Jacob said two weeks ago he started reviewing documents and signing off on them, estimating he may have completed over 250 documents, including provisionals and import. He said the actual department is not shut down.
“There is, in fact, operations taking place to deal with a series of outstanding and provisional permits, variations and et cetera, from the latter part of last year and we discovered there were a lot of applications which were not processed. About 2,000. And it have persons working on it right now,” Jacob said.
“So we felt it would not be wise to totally open up for new applications at this time, as the teams are dealing with the outstanding matters.
“There are several persons within the last two weeks (who) have been engaged by that section and have received a provisional permit and variations. So work is also going on. But also be reminded there is a criminal investigation going on to that aspect of the Firearm Section and also an audit that is going on.
“So these things are why we felt it would be unnecessary to open up to new applications just yet.”
Jacob said he had a meeting on Wednesday with the team of people doing the audit.
He said, “We had a three months plan and we have about six months to go, but we are already seeing there may be need to extend for some additional time, but at the end of this month we will be in a better position to say how much more time will be needed to complete the audit.”
Meanwhile, Jacob said for the year so far, the Police Service had seized approximately 142 firearms, 24 of which are high-powered.
Apart from launching the new National Operations Task Force (NOTF), Jacob also launched the Multi-Agency Firearm Retrieval Initiative.
He said last year, the TTPS seized 680 guns, over 50 of which were high-powered weapons. He added that this programme has already been tested during the early part of this year.
“Working with the agencies as we launch this programme and in so doing, we have recovered 142 firearms. And out of 108 murders for the year so far, 94 were involving the use of firearms,” he added.
The statistics, he said, are a clear indication that there’s a “serious issue with the use of firearms and it is causing murder and other serious injuries to our citizens.”
“So it is necessary that all the agencies come together and work together to deal with this particular initiative,” he said.
He also disclosed that the TTPS has arrested 226 people and charged them for various firearm offences, including shooting and wounding, and possession.
“Yet the scourge continues. So I think we can all understand and appreciate why we need to take this joint approach because it is affecting every one of us and all the various departments. So this effort, we will impact significantly dealing with the aspect of and seizure of firearms in T&T,” Jacob said.