- NEWSDAY.CO.TT - A la Une - 24/Jul 06:33

High alert

TRUE SUCCESS stories are rare for the police service. So, we note the outcome of exercises between July 21-22 which saw the safe extraction of kidnap victim Jankie Satie Karim, 44, from a house in Rampanalgas. Her fate differs from that of recent kidnap victims Kerry Von Adams, 35, and Sachel Kungebeharry, 32, who were both, in incidents months apart, killed after a ransom was paid. No ransom was paid in Ms Karim’s case. Yet, while her safe return is cause for relief, it is not cause for celebration. In fact, aspects of the co-ordinated operations undertaken this week suggest this rare victory was a shallow one and raises disturbing questions about police capacity and methods amid the ongoing state of emergency. One battle has been won, but the war is hardly over. No sooner had the dust settled on the Rampanalgas operation did Police Commissioner Allister Guevarro have to take the unusual step of issuing an advisory to all police officers and prison officials urging their vigilance given intelligence suggesting a hornets’ nest had been raised. Criminal retaliation has been suggested, especially because of steps being taken to disrupt prisoner networks within facilities. Already such threats were the premise of the SoE. The shooting deaths of two suspects during the operations this week by elite officers linked to the Multi-Option Police Section, Anti-Kidnapping Unit and Special Investigations Unit have potentially thrown fuel into the fire. Under no circumstance is violence against cops permissible. Equally, the use-of-force policy of the service, cited in this week’s unconvincingly explained deaths, is at risk of becoming perceived as mere code for extrajudicial killing. If so, that would violate international commitments and stymie the police’s own efforts to dismantle the criminal syndicates which have been fingered by Mr Guevarro in justifying his emergency. These suspects might have had key information. An independent, meaningful and transparent review of what led to these fatalities must occur, inclusive of appropriate legal sanction. Even before the SoE, the level of police killings was unacceptably high. The glaring failures of oversight are already sickening. To use an ongoing emergency as political cover for disproportionate force, however, would be an abuse of the Constitution and an entirely new betrayal of the commitment to protect and serve. Haunted by memories of 1990, the high alert upon which the country has been placed has generated significant unease from Rampanalgas to Port of Spain. Parliament has been reconvened in emergency session to debate the SoE. That sitting on July 28, months into the second Kamla Persad-Bissessar administration, will have to come to grips with an alarmingly transformed landscape, one that increasingly calls for the escalation of protective measures and real-time solutions. The post High alert appeared first on Trinidad and Tobago Newsday.