Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Ad­di­tion­al po­lice of­fi­cers are be­ing sent to To­ba­go to en­hance the is­land’s crime-fight­ing ca­pa­bil­i­ties.

Two of three co­horts of po­lice of­fi­cers from new per­ma­nent­ly sta­tioned units, in­clud­ing 15 of­fi­cers from the In­ter-Agency Task Force and Guard and Emer­gency Branch, ar­rived on the is­land on Mon­day evening.

More of­fi­cers will ar­rive in the com­ing days, in­clud­ing a co­hort that in­cludes re­cruits ex­pect­ed to­mor­row.

At a town hall meet­ing in Char­lot­teville on Mon­day night, ACP Col­lis Hazel said the ad­di­tion­al of­fi­cers would strength­en po­lice op­er­a­tions on the is­land.

“Our po­lice ser­vice in To­ba­go come Thurs­day will be strength­ened by 21 brand new of­fi­cers, so there is no need now for us to talk about short staff,” he said.

There has been a 50 per cent in­crease in mur­ders in To­ba­go with ten record­ed in the first five months of the year.

Three weeks ago, Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine called for more spe­cial­ist units on the is­land. He lat­er an­nounced at a me­dia con­fer­ence that for the first time in To­ba­go, an of­fice was be­ing set up to ac­com­mo­date the In­ter-Agency Task Force and Guard and Emer­gency Branch.

Last Thurs­day, at Con­ver­sa­tions with the Prime Min­is­ter in Scar­bor­ough, Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley said of­fi­cers in those units are trained to de­tect and “act on fresh and grow­ing crim­i­nal threats”.

With the ad­di­tion­al of­fi­cers, Hazel said he is con­fi­dent the po­lice will be able to com­bat crime ef­fec­tive­ly and main­tain pub­lic safe­ty. How­ev­er, he re­mind­ed vil­lagers of their im­por­tant role.

“We can have the best strate­gies and best ap­proach­es to polic­ing but it is good to un­der­stand that you can help us in slow­ing the ... prob­lems,” he said.

“There is a lot of idle­ness, there is a lot of drugs that has just crept their way in­to this very qui­et com­mu­ni­ty.”

Hazel en­cour­aged res­i­dents to work with the po­lice and “not let drugs and crime ru­in the com­mu­ni­ty and be run over by gang­sters”.

He al­so warned them about the con­se­quences of en­cour­ag­ing delin­quen­cy and help­ing crim­i­nals.

“Don’t con­done what is wrong. That has to change. The same peo­ple do­ing the wrong may be the same per­sons who are your nephews, or cousins and when we get them locked up don’t come in my of­fice and cry. You are en­cour­ag­ing them but we will be deal­ing with them as crim­i­nals,” he said.

Dur­ing the meet­ing, res­i­dents com­plained about gang vi­o­lence and drug-re­lat­ed ac­tiv­i­ties in­creas­ing in the com­mu­ni­ty and be­com­ing a heavy in­flu­ence on young peo­ple.

One res­i­dent com­plained that po­lice in the area were lack­lus­tre in their re­sponse to his warn­ings about the emerg­ing gang cul­ture. He claimed gang vi­o­lence was spread­ing quick­ly across Char­lot­teville.

A vil­lage said he was scared by this de­vel­op­ing trend and ap­pealed to the po­lice to in­ter­vene and act quick­ly, while an­oth­er said he was dis­ap­point­ed at the no-show of the Chief Sec­re­tary, who is the rep­re­sen­ta­tive for the area. He said he had hoped to lob­by the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly for prop­er light­ing to be in­stalled at the Char­lot­teville Jet­ty.