Category Archives: Crime in T&T

Spinning Top in Mud

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
June 15, 2011

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeTrinidad and Tobago ought to pause a moment; catch its collective breath, and then ask: where are we going as a nation. Anyone who viewed the video about Niyoka Folkes, a student of Barataria North Secondary School or saw the pummeling she received or the photographs of her bruises that appeared on the newspapers, cannot help but wonder at the sad turn of events at our public schools. That even an adult jumped in to add her blows seems to a dispassionate observer that our society might be going mad.
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Pitbulls no more

Newsday Editorial
May 12 2011 – newsday.co.tt

Dangerous DogWe could not concur more with the seizure of the roaming pack of pitbulls that attacked and killed an unsuspecting Denise Rackal early Monday morning. The overwhelming public sentiment might be “blame the owner”—a police corporal whose property, ill prepared to hold one animal — could not be expected to contain eight pitbulls. We understand that sentiment. The dogs should have been secure and a policeman should have exercised better judgment. But these dogs are killers which may not be permitted to remain at large.
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Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar Fires Mary King

Minister Mary KingThe appointment of Minister and Senator Mrs. Mary King was revoked, today, 10th May, 2010 by the President, His Excellency George Maxwell Richards on advice of the Prime Minister. Mrs. King held the portfolio of Senator and Minister of Planning, Economic and Social Restructuring and Gender Affairs from May 28th, 2010.
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Search on for illegal Chinese immigrants

Chinese workers in Trinidad
Chinese workers in Trinidad

guardian.co.tt
May 09, 2011

Immigration officials have begun hunting down illegal Chinese nationals who have come into T&T to “slave” in thriving casinos, Chinese supermarkets, restaurants and private members’ clubs. But while the hunt goes on inland, senior police officers lament that the coastlines of T&T remain open for human trafficking and smuggling of illegal cargo including drugs, guns and ammunition. The underworld trafficking ring is believed to be controlled by a branch of the Chinese Triad, a well-organised criminal gang which exploits poor Chinese immigrants. These Chinese workers, desperate for a shot at riches in T&T, come from poor areas of China, including Ningxia, Guizhou and Quinhai.
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Strangers in our land

Newsday Editorial
May 1 2011 – newsday.co.tt

ChineseThe recent kidnapping for ransom of a citizen of China who owned and operated a restaurant at St Helena has brought to the fore, once again, the question of illegal immigrants living and working in Trinidad and Tobago.

Speaking in Senate recently, Independent Senator Rolph Balgobin raised this issue.
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Chinese Kidnapping – Slain Restaurant Owner

Kidnapped Chinese restaurant owner Xue Hua Shan
Kidnapped Chinese restaurant owner Xue Hua Shan

Cops step up search for kidnapped woman
Police probing the kidnapping of Chinese restaurant owner Xue Hua Shan said her relatives told them that the woman’s mother, in China, received a text message saying her daughter was released. The text message, police said, was sent in a Chinese dialect to Shan’s mother who lives in China. Investigators said they had not contacted Shan’s mother and did not know if the message was true or a hoax. But detectives said yesterday that they were still looking for Shan and had no concrete evidence she had been released by her kidnappers. The lawmen said they have stepped up their search for Shan after also receiving a message from someone who called the Piarco Police Station around 6.30 am yesterday, claiming she had been dropped off near a bridge in St Helena.
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Mentoring T&T’s Youths

By Dr. Kwame Nantambu
April 19, 2011

Dr. Kwame NantambuWhile the People’s Partnership (PP) government’s National Mentoring Programme should be widely lauded, much more needs to be done/analyzed in order to confront and deal with the ubiquitous “criminal gang culture” in T&T.

The fact of the matter is that the proclivity to commit crime among this country’s “at risk” youths is values-oriented-related-driven.
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Ish, Steve get bail

By Alexander Bruzual
April 1 2011 – newsday.co.tt

Ishwar Galbaransingh and Steve FergusonBUSINESSMEN Ishwar Galbaransingh and Steve Ferguson, who have spent the past nine months in jail, were yesterday granted bail by a High Court Judge.

Justice Ronnie Boodoosingh, presiding over Court 20 at the Hall of Justice in Port-of-Spain, granted bail to the men. However, the judge increased the original bail figure of $1 million per accused, to $2 million.
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PNM’s Retrograde Death Penalty Politics

By Dr. Kwame Nantambu
March 05, 2011

HangingMonday, 28 February 2011 will not only live in infamy but it will also be recorded as one of the darkest days in the history of public policy decision-making process in T&T. This historic, albeit unforgettable, day witnessed the opposition PNM voting against the constitutional amendment to resume hanging as the most effective penalty/punishment/deterrent for murder.
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