A search for a kid­napped Venezue­lan teenag­er has re­sult­ed in the dis­cov­ery of a sus­pect­ed hu­man traf­fick­ing ring. 

Ac­cord­ing to a press re­lease from the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS), of­fi­cers of the West­ern Di­vi­sion led by Deputy Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er (DCP) Suzette Mar­tin made the dis­cov­ery while search­ing an apart­ment build­ing in Cunu­pia for a Venezue­lan teenag­er, who was al­leged­ly kid­napped and brought to Trinidad.  

The of­fi­cers found 16 Venezue­lan na­tion­als in one apart­ment, in­clud­ing the re­port­ed vic­tim and an­oth­er mi­nor. 

Two of the Venezue­lan women, ages 20 and 19, were ar­rest­ed as they were iden­ti­fied as the sus­pects in the kid­nap­ping. 

A 55-year-old Trinida­di­an man from Cunu­pia was al­so held. 

The mi­nors and the oth­er women re­mained in po­lice cus­tody at dif­fer­ent sta­tions in west Trinidad, up to late yes­ter­day.

Act­ing Sgt Hug­gins is con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to the in­ci­dent. —Derek Achong

Dozens ar­rest­ed dur­ing po­lice ex­er­cis­es in north, south, and east Trinidad

Sev­er­al dozen per­sons were ar­rest­ed by the po­lice in si­mul­ta­ne­ous ex­er­cis­es in north, east and south Trinidad be­tween Fri­day night and yes­ter­day morn­ing. 

Ac­cord­ing to press re­leas­es is­sued by the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) yes­ter­day af­ter­noon, one ex­er­cise in north­ern Trinidad re­sult­ed in 12 peo­ple be­ing ar­rest­ed and 11 war­rants be­ing ex­e­cut­ed in Mal­abar and Cu­mu­to. 

The war­rants re­lat­ed to out­stand­ing court-or­dered pay­ments against eight men, to­talling $57,733.57. 

Four of the de­tainees were held in Ari­ma for lar­ce­ny-re­lat­ed and out­stand­ing war­rant en­quiries by of­fi­cers, who were fo­cus­ing on stolen ve­hi­cles. 

A sep­a­rate ex­er­cise in Arou­ca re­sult­ed in four ar­rests, in­clud­ing one man who was want­ed for as­sault by beat­ing and an­oth­er want­ed for fail­ing to pay an $800 fine. 

Thir­ty-two peo­ple were ar­rest­ed in a sep­a­rate ex­er­cise in south Trinidad. Thir­teen of those ar­rest­ed were held on out­stand­ing com­mit­ment war­rants for sums rang­ing from $1,500 to $65,000.

In Princes Town and Bar­rack­pore, two men were held for pos­ses­sion of knives, one for mar­i­jua­na pos­ses­sion, one for co­caine pos­ses­sion, and one for wear­ing cam­ou­flage cloth­ing. 

The of­fi­cers al­so is­sued nu­mer­ous fixed penal­ty tick­ets for dri­ving of­fences. 

Mean­while, an ex­er­cise in east­ern Trinidad re­sult­ed in 23 ar­rests. 

Eigh­teen were ar­rest­ed in San­gre Grande for out­stand­ing war­rants. One man from San Souci was ar­rest­ed near Ba­lan­dra for be­ing in pos­ses­sion of  126 grammes of mar­i­jua­na. 

Po­lice of­fi­cers in Rio Claro al­so raid­ed a bar, searched the pa­trons and ar­rest­ed three of them. 

One man was ar­rest­ed as part of a rob­bery in­ves­ti­ga­tion, while the oth­er was held for a wound­ing probe. The third man was ar­rest­ed for us­ing ob­scene lan­guage and re­sist­ing ar­rest.