Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Home in­va­sions are now be­com­ing pop­u­lar among crim­i­nals in Trinidad and To­ba­go. Over the East­er week­end, there were re­ports of at least four home in­va­sions in var­i­ous parts of the coun­try.

Two of the home in­va­sions took place in Aranguez and Cunu­pia.

The men en­tered the homes ask­ing for cash and valu­ables.

There were al­so re­ports of home in­va­sions in Cu­mu­to and Arou­ca over the week­end, and an­oth­er break-in in Debe yes­ter­day.

These in­va­sions over time have got­ten more vi­o­lent as fam­i­ly mem­bers in­clud­ing chil­dren are beat­en by these ban­dits.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, se­cu­ri­ty an­a­lyst and Chief Ex­ec­u­tive Of­fi­cer of AE Tac­ti­cal Lim­it­ed, Luke Hadeed said the key­word in deal­ing with home in­va­sions is readi­ness, pre­pared­ness.

He said it was our col­lec­tive re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to be pre­pared, and be­ing pre­pared is by hav­ing all bases cov­ered.

“So we all know the phys­i­cal se­cu­ri­ty, cam­eras, some peo­ple have dogs, oth­er peo­ple go in­to elec­tron­ic se­cu­ri­ty, oth­er as­pects that they could af­ford to out­fit their home premis­es with and what have you.

“But pre­pared­ness is im­por­tant, es­pe­cial­ly com­mu­ni­ca­tion amongst fam­i­ly mem­bers, what to do, what not to do, not be­ing com­pla­cent and at the same time not in­fring­ing on your free­doms.”

He said in T&T, un­for­tu­nate­ly, crime was cost­ing us our free­dom and our lib­er­ties to en­joy our­selves.

Hadeed not­ed that it is cost­ly for some peo­ple to con­tin­ue to in­vest in phys­i­cal se­cu­ri­ty, whether it’s an alarm sys­tem, cam­eras, or oth­er phys­i­cal se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures in home im­prove­ment. But he said be­ing pre­pared, know­ing your en­vi­ron­ment, and seek­ing the right ad­vice, were key and should be utilised. “Every­body in Trinidad knows some­body who could give them the right type of ad­vice...Be­ing pre­pared is as sim­ple as hav­ing the right phys­i­cal mea­sures or know­ing who to call, when to call...” he added.

Hadeed said one of the most pow­er­ful things avail­able to us now, which is a free tool, is to be part of our What­sApp group, “a group that has re­spon­si­ble peo­ple from any neigh­bour­hood and the com­mu­ni­ty that could as­sist us in be­ing able to be more aware as to what’s hap­pen­ing and to alert our neigh­bours and friends if some­thing is out of place.

“I re­al­ly be­lieve that the po­lice ser­vice is do­ing their earnest best to help the com­mu­ni­ties along with the com­pa­nies, the se­cu­ri­ty com­pa­nies, and the Gov­ern­ment by and large try­ing to get the grips.

“I think it's go­ing to be im­por­tant for us to con­tin­ue to de­mand that se­cu­ri­ty from the Gov­ern­ment, and the State, but at the same time to not be hard on them in terms of try­ing to put new re­spon­si­bil­i­ty or place the blame some­where."

Hadeed said when it comes to crime, per­son­al safe­ty, and pro­tec­tion, "There is no sil­ver bul­let, not be­cause you own a firearm or not be­cause they have a new com­mis­sion of po­lice or not be­cause the Gov­ern­ment's job, so to speak, is to pro­vide us with se­cu­ri­ty."

He said the more we could come to­geth­er, the more we pre­pare is a sure bet that we'll con­tin­ue to beat this scourge.