Jensen La Vende 

Se­nior Re­porter 

jensen.lavende@guardian.co.tt 

A prison of­fi­cer re­mains hos­pi­talised in sta­ble con­di­tion af­ter a brazen gun at­tack near Pi­ar­co Plaza on Fri­day night, mo­ments af­ter fin­ish­ing his shift at the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison.

Govin­dra Bal­go­b­in, 38, was am­bushed and shot twice—once in the leg and once in the arm—by gun­men in a Nis­san Wingroad who opened fire along Or­ange Grove Road. Fol­low­ing the at­tack, two sus­pects were ar­rest­ed af­ter crash­ing their get­away ve­hi­cle, but a third at­tack­er re­mains on the run.

Po­lice said the man, who was seen calm­ly walk­ing away af­ter the ve­hi­cle crashed, re­mained on the run up to late yes­ter­day. A man­hunt has been launched for his ar­rest.

The at­tack has sent shock­waves through the prison ser­vice, with act­ing Pris­ons Com­mis­sion­er Car­los Cor­raspe con­demn­ing the as­sault as “cow­ard­ly” and pres­i­dent of the Prison Of­fi­cers’ As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go Ger­ard Gor­don warn­ing that prison of­fi­cers are “un­der at­tack”—not on­ly from crim­i­nals but from a sys­tem slow to pro­tect them.  He said it sym­bol­ised that the coun­try was in cri­sis.

The in­ci­dent has left Bal­go­b­in’s col­leagues con­cerned, and of­fi­cers are be­ing urged to re­main vig­i­lant.

Po­lice re­port­ed that around 8:25 pm, Bal­go­b­in was head­ing home af­ter work when he was am­bushed and shot.

Gun­men in a Nis­san Wingroad pulled along­side him and opened fire, hit­ting him twice—once in the leg and once in the arm.

In their at­tempt to es­cape, the dri­ver lost con­trol of the get­away ve­hi­cle, crash­ing in­to a light pole along the Churchill-Roo­sevelt High­way. One of the at­tack­ers was thrown from the car, while an­oth­er was ar­rest­ed short­ly af­ter. A hand­gun and cell­phone were re­cov­ered from the ve­hi­cle.

Prison sources be­lieve the at­tack may have been linked to a failed vis­it at the Port-of-Spain Prison last week.

Prison of­fi­cials said a fe­male rel­a­tive of an in­mate at the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison, where Bal­go­b­in is sta­tioned, had an al­ter­ca­tion with an of­fi­cer, lead­ing to the can­cel­la­tion of her vis­it.

Act­ing Pris­ons Com­mis­sion­er Car­los Cor­raspe said the prison ser­vice was work­ing close­ly with po­lice and oth­er law en­force­ment agen­cies to en­sure a swift and thor­ough in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to what he de­scribed as “a heinous act of vi­o­lence against an of­fi­cer”.

He added, “For the re­moval of any doubt, it con­sti­tutes a most di­rect at­tack on the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem of Trinidad and To­ba­go, with the in­tent of bring­ing fear to the prison sys­tem. It is re­pu­di­at­ed in full, as prison of­fi­cers will con­tin­ue to work dili­gent­ly, up­hold­ing the oath that we have tak­en to pro­tect so­ci­ety. There will be no re­treat and ab­solute­ly no sur­ren­der in this re­gard.” 

Of­fi­cers told be vig­i­lant

Gor­don took to so­cial me­dia to urge of­fi­cers to re­main vig­i­lant and called on the au­thor­i­ties to take the nec­es­sary steps to en­sure the safe­ty of prison of­fi­cers.

“Let us be clear: Prison Of­fi­cers are un­der at­tack—and not just by crim­i­nals, but by the si­lence, in­ac­tion, and de­lay of those elect­ed to pro­tect and lead. The as­so­ci­a­tion has tak­en the State to court over the is­sue of safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty, a mat­ter that has dragged on for near­ly a decade. And yet, even as of­fi­cers are gunned down, hunt­ed and ter­rorised, no mean­ing­ful change has been im­ple­ment­ed.

“We re­cent­ly re­mind­ed the Gov­ern­ment, via a for­mal state­ment, of our sup­port for the for­mer op­po­si­tion leader and now Prime Min­is­ter’s call to arm law en­force­ment of­fi­cers and pro­tect their well-be­ing. In that same com­mu­ni­ca­tion, we pro­posed again the Law En­force­ment Of­fi­cer Safe­ty Act, which of­fers a struc­tured path to ad­dress these sys­temic fail­ures. But tonight’s (Fri­day) at­tack is yet an­oth­er bru­tal re­minder that time is run­ning out.” 

In a sub­se­quent in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, Gor­don ex­pressed con­fi­dence that, un­der the cur­rent ad­min­is­tra­tion, the con­cerns of prison of­fi­cers will be ad­dressed.

“We are ap­peal­ing to our new min­is­ter that we are pre­pared to work along with him and the Gov­ern­ment to ad­dress these is­sues, and we ver­i­ly be­lieve that if there is any time in our his­to­ry where we can achieve the changes that are nec­es­sary to se­cure prison of­fi­cers and their fam­i­lies, we be­lieve it is un­der this cur­rent ad­min­is­tra­tion.” 

Dur­ing the prison ser­vice’s sports and fam­i­ly day last month, the act­ing Pris­ons Com­mis­sion­er com­mend­ed his of­fi­cers for their ded­i­ca­tion to du­ty af­ter they were threat­ened fol­low­ing a search at the Port-of-Spain Prison. 

He re­mind­ed the in­mates that their pres­ence at the pris­ons was not by in­vi­ta­tion but by court or­der, and he and his of­fi­cers will main­tain or­der with­in the con­fines of all pris­ons, as is their man­date.  

“I say to the na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty, and I say to the in­mate pop­u­la­tion, no­body brought a sin­gle in­mate to the con­fines of the prison by virtue of an in­vi­ta­tion. There is a war­rant that is is­sued that com­mands the com­mis­sion­er to hold you there. And while you are there, there shall be law and or­der main­tained. 

“We will con­duct our du­ties law­ful­ly. We will search every nook and cran­ny of every prison. We com­mand that space. We shall main­tain that space. And if it comes to threats to our of­fi­cers, I want you to know that we will stand firm. We will stand to­geth­er to en­sure that those threats do not come to pass.” 

Guardian Me­dia reached out to Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der but he did not re­spond.

Of­fi­cers killed in the past

In 2021, prison of­fi­cer Trevor Ser­rette was killed at his veg­etable and fruit stall in Va­len­cia. Days lat­er, Nigel Jones was shot dead in Siparia. In 2023, Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Pris­ons Sher­wyn Bruce was at­tacked as he was about to leave his San­ta Cruz home. A 22-year-old man was lat­er charged with six of­fences aris­ing out of that at­tack.

Last year, an­oth­er prison of­fi­cer, Kendell Smith, was mur­dered while at Sama­roo Vil­lage, Ari­ma. His mur­der was not linked to his job.

Cor­raspe said there were many oth­er planned at­tacks on prison of­fi­cers, but they were foiled thanks to co­op­er­a­tive ef­forts by arms of the na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty.

At least four of­fi­cers were at­tacked, with the homes of two of­fi­cers be­ing fire­bombed in Jan­u­ary.

Fol­low­ing those at­tacks, the Prison Of­fi­cers’ As­so­ci­a­tion post­ed on so­cial me­dia a call for vig­i­lance.

“All mem­bers, please be on high alert. In­for­ma­tion com­ing is that a hefty boun­ty may have been placed on ANY mem­ber of the Trinidad & To­ba­go Prison Ser­vice.”

Of­fi­cers’ lives were threat­ened if in­mates and/or of­fi­cers were trans­ferred from Build­ing 13 at the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison in Arou­ca.