Category Archives: Crime in T&T

Drugs Don’t Kill People, Neoliberalism Kills People

By Brad Blankenship
November 22, 2017 – telesurtv.net

DrugsOpioids, a class of drugs chemically similar to the painkiller morphine, have been sweeping across North America since the late 1990s into the first two decades of the 2000s. These powerful sedative drugs, which include prescription painkillers like oxycodone and powerful street drugs such as heroin, are extremely deadly because their depressant effects can stop a user from breathing. Because of their widespread and ever-increasing use, drug overdose deaths “are the leading cause of injury death in the United States,” according to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS).
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A time to kill

By Raffique Shah
November 30, 2017

Raffique ShahI am not optimistic over the Prime Minister’s promise to citizens that the near-riot that erupted for the umpteenth time last week in the Beetham community will not occur again.

Dr Keith Rowley said he has directed the heads of the Police Service and the Defence Force to ensure that law and order are enforced in Beetham and elsewhere in the country even as people exercise their right to protest. He called for those who used the recent disturbance to engage in criminal acts to be prosecuted, and acting Commissioner of Police Stephen Williams said he had a team of officers examining video footage of the mayhem to identify and arrest the culprits.
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Vicky Boodram recaptured

…found in house hours after ‘public’ meal

By Jensen La Vende, Kevon Felmine
December o1, 2017 – guardian.co.tt

Vicky Nirupa BoodramThree days after alleged fraudster Vicky Boodram escaped from the Women’s Prison at Golden Grove, Arouca, she was recaptured in Penal last night.

Officers from the Criminal Gang and Intelligence Unit, acting on intelligence, went to a house at Sunchine Drive off Lachoos Road, just before 7 pm. They later found Boodram, 35, hiding in the house.
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BEETHAM BADNESS

Shots fired, debris thrown on highway after 2 arrested

By Ryan Hamilton-Davis
November 24, 2017 – newsday.co.tt

BEETHAM BADNESSAfter the arrest of two of their own, Beetham residents vented their anger by throwing debris onto the highway and then firing shots when police arrived to clear the rubble and restore order.

What followed was hours of gridlock on the east-bound and west-bound sections of the highway, the Priority Bus Route and the Eastern Main Road.

Head of the Port of Spain Division, Snr Supt Floris Hodge-Griffith told Newsday she and her officers had to duck for cover when they were shot at on arriving at the Beetham. Hodge-Griffith said she was driving in a marked police vehicle on the Beetham Highway at about 10.45 am when she encountered the blockade.
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Only in Trinidad

By Raffique Shah
November 23, 2017

Raffique ShahUntil such time as persons in public life who are criminally responsible for stealing from the public purse, or for abusing their powers to enable their friends or associates to unfairly, maybe even illegally, acquire state lands or subsidised housing, are thrown into jail like the common thieves they are, this society will continue to decay, to fall apart, hurtling towards a failed state, a dubious title that we seem hell-bent on attaining, as if it were an achievement we can be proud of.
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Sexual misconduct haunts public figures

By Raffique Shah
November 16, 2017

Raffique ShahAmidst an avalanche of allegations of sexual misconduct against a phalanx of prominent men, mostly in the USA, but also in other developed countries, one can anticipate a similar surge here in Trinidad and Tobago, although our litigation procedures are more constrained, some might argue restrictive, than in those jurisdictions. I argue, too, that cultural differences influence the way the local public, if not the courts, view such allegations.
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No scruples, no consciences

By Raffique Shah
November 9, 2017

Raffique ShahTwo Thursdays ago, at around 11 a.m., one of my brothers was robbed at gunpoint as he pulled up at the entrance to his home off Beaucarro Road. He had returned from First Citizens Bank in Couva where he had withdrawn a few thousand dollars to pay farmers who supply him with hot peppers. Three young men, one armed with a gun, rushed him and threatened to kill him. They searched his pockets, stole the cash, his wallet (with vital documents) and phone. After seizing his keys from his car and telling him to run for his life, they bolted to a car parked nearby and made good their escape.
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Targeting Dr. Williams

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
November 06, 2017

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeIn October (2006) I reviewed Colin Palmer’s Eric Williams and the Making of the Modern Caribbean for the Journal of British Studies. I congratulated Palmer for exposing the intrigue of Britain and the United States against Williams when he fought for the return of Chaguaramas for the federal capital of the Federation of the West Indies. I wrote: “It might come as a shock to many that the United States gave some thought to ‘eliminating’ Williams during the Chaguaramas discussion. The British sought to sabotage his efforts.”
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Considering a new commissioner

By Raffique Shah
October 19, 2017

Raffique ShahThe last hope we have for reining in runaway crime in this country lies with a leader yet unknown, the man or woman who will be recommended by the Police Service Commission to be named Commissioner of Police, subject to approval by Parliament. In fact, since crime affects so many aspects of citizens’ daily lives as well as the country’s economy, and because the Police Service is, or ought to be, the spearhead of any assault on crime, the new commissioner will carry on his shoulders a burden bigger than Government’s, and greater expectations than any other office-holder in the State-apparatus—the President, the Prime Minister or the Chief Justice.
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