An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

A week-long covert in­tel­li­gence and sur­veil­lance op­er­a­tion has re­sult­ed in the seizure of ap­prox­i­mate­ly ten ki­los of mar­i­jua­na, which had been con­cealed in a bar­rel at a cus­toms-bond­ed ware­house in El So­cor­ro.

How­ev­er, two dif­fer­ent units from the TTPS showed up at the scene to take charge of the con­tra­band, lead­ing to a “Blue-on-Blue” sit­u­a­tion.

Com­mend­ing the of­fi­cers in­volved in the ex­er­cise yes­ter­day, As­sis­tant Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (ACP), Ad­min­is­tra­tion, Curt Si­mon dis­missed so­cial me­dia re­ports that im­plied of­fi­cers from two dif­fer­ent di­vi­sions had “squared” off in an al­leged con­fronta­tion over the il­le­gal drugs, which was ini­tial­ly thought to in­clude il­le­gal guns and am­mu­ni­tion.

So­cial me­dia ex­plod­ed around noon with re­ports that a con­tin­gent of po­lice of­fi­cers, in­clud­ing per­son­nel from the Spe­cial Branch and the Spe­cial In­ves­ti­ga­tions Unit (SIU), had been sum­moned to the lo­ca­tion af­ter of­fi­cers from the Cen­tral Di­vi­sion Task Force (CDTF) ar­rived around 10 am and de­mand­ed ac­cess to the bar­rel.

It was al­leged that the “ac­cost­ing” team of law en­force­ment per­son­nel had dis­armed the CDTF of­fi­cers and had been ad­vised to es­cort them to the Po­lice Ad­min­is­tra­tion Build­ing in Port-of-Spain.

Speak­ing with re­porters briefly as he head­ed to the lo­ca­tion, Si­mon sought to clar­i­fy what had tran­spired dur­ing what he de­scribed as a “ba­sic, rou­tine in­tel­li­gence ex­er­cise”.

He said, “It in­volved two sep­a­rate units in the po­lice ser­vice hav­ing very sim­i­lar in­tel­li­gence.

“They were both op­er­at­ing at the same time in the same place, and that is what we call a Blue-on-Blue sit­u­a­tion.

“It is noth­ing to be alarmed about,” he added, “It does oc­cur from time to time in dif­fer­ent polic­ing ju­ris­dic­tions.”

In­di­cat­ing the mat­ter had been quick­ly re­solved, Si­mon com­mend­ed all the of­fi­cers in­volved, as he said this was ev­i­dence of their un­wa­ver­ing and re­lent­less ef­forts in the fight against crime.

Pressed to say if some of­fi­cers had been ar­rest­ed and dis­armed by their col­leagues dur­ing the al­leged “stand off”, Si­mon urged the pub­lic to be wary of so­cial me­dia.

Head of the An­ti-Ex­tor­tion Unit, ACP Richard Smith, said, “This just goes to show how dan­ger­ous so­cial me­dia could be.”

He urged peo­ple post­ing such re­ports, and even those shar­ing them, to ver­i­fy the in­for­ma­tion, as it could cause un­nec­es­sary pan­ic and un­due con­ster­na­tion.

Smith said that al­though no one was held in con­nec­tion with the find, in­ves­ti­ga­tions are con­tin­u­ing.

The TTPS said all of­fi­cers in­volved have re­mained on du­ty, while joint State of Emer­gency (SoE) op­er­a­tions con­tin­ue na­tion­wide un­der es­tab­lished com­mand and con­trol pro­ce­dures.