RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

San Fer­nan­do busi­ness­peo­ple say they are wor­ried af­ter the brazen breach of the San Fer­nan­do Mu­nic­i­pal Po­lice Sta­tion and the theft of a cache of firearms, with one jew­ellery store own­er now plan­ning to shut down op­er­a­tions by next year due to es­ca­lat­ing crime.

Al­though po­lice have since re­cov­ered 38 of the stolen weapons and con­duct­ed a se­ries of raids, un­ease con­tin­ues to grip the com­mer­cial hub.

Yes­ter­day, busi­ness­es along High Street opened as usu­al, and po­lice pa­trols re­mained vis­i­ble. But be­neath the sur­face, fear lin­gered.

“It’s a som­bre mood for ob­vi­ous rea­sons,” Greater San Fer­nan­do Cham­ber of Com­merce pres­i­dent Ki­ran Singh said.

“This mur­der has re­al­ly hit us in a very neg­a­tive way, but we still have busi­ness to run… we have to pay work­ers, main­tain our fam­i­lies, and pay bills.”

Singh said while op­er­a­tions con­tin­ue, many busi­ness own­ers are now ques­tion­ing their safe­ty and how long they can re­main open each day.

“The fear fac­tor is there—how late can we open?” he said.

The con­cerns come in the wake of the killing of a mu­nic­i­pal po­lice of­fi­cer, WPC Anusha Ever­s­ley, at the sta­tion and the theft of dozens of firearms and am­mu­ni­tion from the fa­cil­i­ty—an in­ci­dent Singh de­scribed as deeply trou­bling.

“The po­lice sta­tion is sup­posed to be the safest build­ing in the coun­try, and un­for­tu­nate­ly, this was proven oth­er­wise,” he said.

He praised law en­force­ment for their swift ac­tion in de­tain­ing sus­pects and re­cov­er­ing weapons, but stressed that any firearm in crim­i­nal hands re­mains a se­ri­ous threat.

“Any il­le­gal firearm—one firearm—is one too much,” Singh said, adding that the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty is hop­ing for fur­ther re­cov­er­ies in the com­ing days.

De­spite the de­vel­op­ments, he ac­knowl­edged that con­fi­dence has been shak­en, par­tic­u­lar­ly with rev­e­la­tions that some of the in­di­vid­u­als in cus­tody are mu­nic­i­pal po­lice of­fi­cers.

“What we ex­pect is that those in au­thor­i­ty will in­spire con­fi­dence in the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty that the po­lice ser­vice, by and large, is a safe in­sti­tu­tion,” Singh said.

“We can­not paint a broad brush… there are rogue el­e­ments, but there are al­so many of­fi­cers do­ing good work.”

Singh al­so called for ur­gent re­forms, in­clud­ing reg­u­lar psy­cho­log­i­cal eval­u­a­tions and stricter mon­i­tor­ing of of­fi­cers.

“Giv­en the stress­ful en­vi­ron­ment, there should be year­ly psy­cho­me­t­ric eval­u­a­tions, firearm us­age re­views, and phys­i­cal fit­ness tests,” he said.

For­mer po­lice com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith echoed sim­i­lar con­cerns, warn­ing that the cur­rent struc­ture of mu­nic­i­pal polic­ing lacks prop­er over­sight.

“You can­not have a par­al­lel or­gan­i­sa­tion,” Grif­fith said, ar­gu­ing that mu­nic­i­pal po­lice of­fi­cers should fall di­rect­ly un­der the au­thor­i­ty of the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice.

He ex­plained that the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice cur­rent­ly has lim­it­ed con­trol over mu­nic­i­pal of­fi­cers, in­clud­ing their train­ing, per­for­mance mon­i­tor­ing and op­er­a­tional de­ploy­ment.

“The Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice has very lit­tle over­sight. It cre­ates du­pli­ca­tion of re­sources and gaps in ac­count­abil­i­ty,” Grif­fith said.

Grif­fith said the sit­u­a­tion has un­fair­ly placed the na­tion­al po­lice ser­vice un­der scruti­ny for an en­ti­ty it does not ful­ly con­trol.

“This is not to dis­cred­it mu­nic­i­pal of­fi­cers but the sys­tem al­lows gaps that should not ex­ist,” he added.

He urged au­thor­i­ties to fo­cus on so­lu­tions rather than blame.

“Now is not the time for fin­ger-point­ing. It is time to fix the sys­tem,” Grif­fith said.