Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

A mu­nic­i­pal po­lice of­fi­cer has won his ap­peal over the de­ci­sion of the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er to refuse him a per­son­al firearm user’s li­cence (FUL).

De­liv­er­ing a de­ci­sion yes­ter­day, the Firearm Ap­peals Board, led by Chair­man Faraaz Mo­hammed, up­held the ap­peal from the of­fi­cer, whose name was with­held due to se­cu­ri­ty con­cerns raised by his lawyers Lester Chari­ah and Kent Sam­lal.

Ac­cord­ing to the ev­i­dence be­fore the board, the of­fi­cer ap­plied for a FUL to pos­sess a firearm while off du­ty in 2018.

He was forced to reap­ply in 2019 af­ter be­ing in­formed that his orig­i­nal ap­pli­ca­tion was lost.

His lawyers sent a pre-ac­tion pro­to­col let­ter to the Of­fice of the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er af­ter he did not re­ceive a re­sponse af­ter sev­er­al years.

In Oc­to­ber 2022, he was in­formed that his ap­pli­ca­tion was de­nied be­cause in­ves­ti­ga­tions re­vealed that he was of “in­tem­per­ate be­hav­iour” and was un­fit to be en­trust­ed with a firearm and am­mu­ni­tion.

In his ap­peal, the of­fi­cer chal­lenged in­con­sis­tent re­ports of three po­lice of­fi­cers, who were tasked with in­ves­ti­gat­ing his ap­pli­ca­tion.

His lawyers claimed that the of­fi­cers made vary­ing find­ings over the of­fi­cer’s abil­i­ty to safe­ly se­cure a firearm at his home.

They al­so took is­sue with two of the of­fi­cers re­ly­ing on un­sub­stan­ti­at­ed al­le­ga­tions, that the of­fi­cer would act ag­gres­sive­ly while con­sum­ing al­co­hol at home, from neigh­bours.

“As to the cen­tral is­sue of breach of nat­ur­al jus­tice, the claimant’s as­ser­tion is that he was not giv­en an op­por­tu­ni­ty to be heard con­cern­ing the neg­a­tive com­ments made about him and his be­hav­iour,” they said.

“While it is ac­cept­ed that it is not in every in­stance that nat­ur­al jus­tice re­quires that a per­son be af­ford­ed an op­por­tu­ni­ty to be heard, the cir­cum­stances here­in, es­pe­cial­ly in light of the pos­i­tive com­men­da­tions and rec­om­men­da­tions in the Ap­pel­lant’s favour, and the fact that the Ap­pel­lant is pro­vid­ed with a firearm whilst on du­ty, re­quired some con­sid­er­a­tion,” he added.

In de­fence of the case, the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er’s Of­fice sought to ex­plain why three in­ves­ti­ga­tions were done.

It claimed that the first probe was not com­pre­hen­sive, so a sec­ond was com­mis­sioned. A third probe was done to cor­rob­o­rate the find­ings of the sec­ond in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

“It is sub­mit­ted that such be­hav­iour as re­port­ed in the sec­ond and third in­ves­tiga­tive re­ports in­di­cates a high like­li­hood of dan­ger to the pub­lic safe­ty or peace if the ap­pel­lant is in pos­ses­sion of a firearm,” at­tor­ney Amy-Marie Castagne said.

Castagne al­so claimed that the fact that the of­fi­cer was is­sued a ser­vice pis­tol while on du­ty over the past 12 years did not mean that he should be au­to­mat­i­cal­ly is­sued a per­son­al FUL.

“It is sub­mit­ted that with the use of ser­vice firearms, there are many in­her­ent safe­guards for use, such as the fun­da­men­tal su­per­vi­sion and over­sight of se­nior of­fi­cers whilst on du­ty and the need to re­port to them, the timed use and the re­quire­ment to sign in and sign out for a ser­vice firearm, the strict reg­u­la­tions against drink­ing whilst on du­ty, and the fact that ser­vice is­sues will on­ly be for spec­i­fied roles gov­erned by set guide­lines and pro­to­cols and backed by the nec­es­sary train­ing for prop­er use and the rel­e­vant con­se­quences for any mis­use,” she said.

The board up­held the sub­mis­sions of the of­fi­cer’s lawyers as it up­held the ap­peal and re­versed the de­nial of the FUL.