Sascha Wil­son

The sol­dier held for ques­tion­ing in Mon­day’s fa­tal rob­bery at Pen­ny­wise Plaza in La Ro­main has been re­leased from po­lice cus­tody.

This fol­lows a habeas cor­pus writ filed by the sol­dier two days af­ter he was de­tained by the po­lice. On Fri­day Jus­tice Devin­dra Ram­per­sad gave in­ves­ti­ga­tors un­til 2 pm yes­ter­day to con­duct an iden­ti­fi­ca­tion (ID) pa­rade with him. But, ac­cord­ing to his at­tor­ney Criston J Williams he was re­leased with­out be­ing placed on the ID pa­rade. He was told that the ID pa­rade was scrapped based on ad­vice from the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP). He was picked up by his rel­a­tives at 2.05 pm from the San Fer­nan­do Po­lice Sta­tion.

Dur­ing the hear­ing on Fri­day, at­tor­ney Gayle Tson­da told the judge that in­ves­ti­ga­tors con­sult­ed with the Of­fice of the DPP and were ad­vised that they should con­duct an ID pa­rade with a man who the sol­dier claimed he was on the way to meet when he was car­jacked.

Claim­ing that it would take 12 hours to make prepa­ra­tions for the ID pa­rade, she said in­ves­ti­ga­tors were con­cerned that if re­leased, the sol­dier may en­gage in the de­struc­tion of ev­i­dence and wit­ness tam­per­ing or that he may flee. In a tele­phone in­ter­view, Williams said, “Af­ter com­ing for­ward with the po­si­tion to de­ny him his fun­da­men­tal rights to lib­er­ty, that he is such a bad guy and they need to con­duct this iden­ti­fi­ca­tion pa­rade, no pa­rade was con­duct­ed.”

Williams claimed that they have in­for­ma­tion about po­lice in­volve­ment in this mat­ter and now his client is fear­ful for his life.

As a re­sult, he said the sol­dier was ex­pect­ed to be picked up by his col­leagues to be tak­en to the Army Base. How­ev­er, Williams said he has in his pos­ses­sion a state­ment from the sol­dier de­tail­ing in­for­ma­tion and ev­i­dence he has in the mat­ter.

He added that in­for­ma­tion has al­so been passed to the Po­lice Com­plaints Au­thor­i­ty to in­ves­ti­gate the po­lice killing of the four sus­pects. “Let’s see how many bul­lets with TTPS is­sued and how many bul­lets came from their (sus­pects) guns,” he added.

Con­tact­ed for a com­ment, Ag Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Mc­Don­ald Ja­cob said the sol­dier was still a sus­pect. He ex­plained that he was re­leased be­cause a habeas cor­pus writ was filed but that does not mean he has been cleared as in­ves­ti­ga­tions are con­tin­u­ing.

Asked why the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion pa­rade was not con­duct­ed, Ja­cob said he could not say as he was “not in the mid­dle of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion to know what they are do­ing”. He added that crime is not just about be­ing on the scene where the of­fence was com­mit­ted.

Sol­dier’s claims

In the court doc­u­ments, the sol­dier’s lawyers, Williams, Jade Mar­tinez and Blaine So­bri­an, claimed that he was ar­rest­ed on Mon­day af­ter he went to the San Fer­nan­do Po­lice Sta­tion to re­port that he had been car­jacked by six armed men in La Ro­main.

The po­lice al­leged that his ve­hi­cle was one of those used in the rob­bery of three se­cu­ri­ty guards at­tached to Al­lied Se­cu­ri­ty Ser­vices in the Pen­ny­wise rob­bery. Two civil­ians were de­tained by in­ves­ti­ga­tors in ad­di­tion to the sol­dier.

The sol­dier’s lawyers claimed his con­tin­ued de­ten­tion for ques­tion­ing con­cern­ing the rob­bery was un­law­ful and un­rea­son­able. At­tached to the writ was an af­fi­davit from the sol­dier’s un­cle, who is the own­er of the Nis­san X-Trail which was be­ing used by the sol­dier.

The un­cle claimed that around 6 pm on Mon­day, he re­ceived a call from an of­fi­cer of the Table­land Po­lice Sta­tion, who told him his ve­hi­cle was in­volved in a hit-and-run ac­ci­dent.

The un­cle claimed that he called his nephew, who an­swered and told him he was robbed of the ve­hi­cle a short while ear­li­er. He said he lat­er learned that his nephew was held for ques­tion­ing con­cern­ing the rob­bery of the se­cu­ri­ty guards.