Category Archives: Crime in T&T

Young mom who spoke to cops shot dead

By Rhondor Dowlat, newsday.co.tt
January 03, 2007

JailA woman who was earlier spotted talking to officers attached to the Anti-Kidnapping Squad (AKS), who were enquiring about a person believed to be linked to the kidnapping of Xtra Foods Supermarket CEO, Vindra Naipaul-Coolman, was later gunned down in front of her house. The woman’s killing was one of two murders recorded yesterday — the second day in the new year. Both victims were gunned down.

The first murder for the year was recorded at about 1 am when a 47-year-old man of Mount Hope was ambushed by gunmen outside his home.
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Bakr Walks Free

By Francis Joseph, newsday.co.tt
Tuesday, December 5 2006

YASIN ABU BAKRYASIN ABU BAKR, the leader of the Jamaat Al Muslimeen, was yesterday afternoon freed of the charge of conspiracy to murder two expelled members of his organisation.

Justice Mustapha Ibrahim stopped the trial at the close of the prosecution’s case. He agreed with lead defence attorney Pamela Elder SC that the prosecution’s case was weak, that the witnesses were unreliable and to convict Bakr on such evidence would lead to a miscarriage of justice.
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Two Visions of Trinidad and Tobago

By Linda E. Edwards

Domestic ViolenceThe screaming headlines of a woman beheaded by “A close family member”- always a husband, were stunning, even for Trinidad’s papers. I found myself again asking why? What can people do to prevent this? The island is really so small that a woman cannot get away from a man who wants to hunt her down. Of course he drank poison. How often in the last five years has this scenario been repeated in Central? I said to myself that I wasn’t going to write any more columns on women being killed by dotish men whom they should have left long ago. Then Ras Tyehimba wrote a piece that gave some hope. A man was talking to men about the serious issue of how they treat women. His piece did not generate half as much comment as did the pieces I wrote first on the issue of land reform in Zimbabwe, and then on the issue of “Indians” pleading for ‘rescue from discrimination’ to the Indian Vice- President. This latter piece resulted in twenty nine comments. There are thirty-two listed, but three are clarification and additional documentation from my own keyboard.
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$250.000 Bail for Chief Justice Satnarine Sharma

TrinidadAndTobagoNews.com Reporters
November 30, 2006

Chief Justice Satnarine SharmaChief Justice Satnarine Sharma has been charged and is now on $250.000 bail. The Chief Justice surrendered to the police to face charges following losing his appeal at the Privy Council. He maintains he did no wrong.

The media stood outside the home of the Chief Justice in Fairways, Maraval, awaiting the next move. At 12:45pm a car came up the driveway of the CJ’s residence and a few moments later it sped away with both the Chief Justice and his wife inside.
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The Chief Justice loses at the Privy Council

TrinidadAndTobagoNews.com Reporters
November 30, 2006

Chief Justice Satnarine SharmaThis morning Chief Justice Satnarine Sharma lost his appeal in the highest appellate court, the Privy Council, in London. Mr. Sharma’s appeal was tried before five Law Lords arguing that the attempt to remove him from office was politically motivated by the Prime Minister, the Attorney General, the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and the Chief Magistrate.

The Privy Council ruled that there was no evidence to prove that there was collusion involving the Prime Minister, the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Attorney General and the Chief Magistrate. They were not convinced that the Chief Justice’s complaint could not be fairly resolved within the criminal courts.
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Male Arrogance, Abuse and Intimate Relationships

by Ras Tyehimba
October 17, 2006

Recently, I read in the media of the incident involving Anita Lutchmepersad, who was forced to leave her home because of the threatening abuses of a ‘close male relative’. After she left, he burnt down the house and drank detergent in an apparent suicide bid. According to one newspaper report, the male relative had seen a text message from one of Anita’s co-workers and misinterpreted it, getting in to a fit of rage. Another newspaper report told of Devica Mahabir who survived being poisoned, beaten and burned but was left horribly disfigured by her husband who killed himself after murdering her lover. What are the factors at play in such scenarios? How do so many relationships which SEEM to start off so good and which are supposedly based on ‘love’ be filled with so much mistrust, pain and abuse?
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Why No Sex Offenders Registry?

ViolenceThey did not kidnap and rape anyone important.

Comment by Linda E. Edwards

There is a shady gray area where the minds of many men seem to “lurk”. It is the area of “rough sex”, “stealing a piece(tiefing)”, “she asking for trouble”, and “she like it so”. This gray area of fantasy sends men to watch movies that women, sensible women, would not be caught dead watching. It sends them to “gentlemen’s clubs” – titty bars and “cat houses” to see acts of sex, real and simulated, that their wives would not perform for fear that their husbands beat the daylights out of them. “Wey she learn that from? I ent teach she dat”. Men still make clear distinctions about women and sex.
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Sharma’s road to London

By Francis Joseph, newsday.co.tt
Sunday, October 1 2006

AFTER Chief Justice Clinton Bernard retired in 1995, Appeal Court Justice Sat Sharma was next in line for the coveted post of head of TT’s judiciary. But he did not get the job. The position went instead to an eminent attorney, Michael de la Bastide SC. So Sharma waited. His turn eventually came in July 2002 and he was appointed Chief Justice by then President Arthur NR Robinson.
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A New Type of Criminal Is Emerging

By Linda E. Edwards

The Laventille Hills east Port of Spain area earned a reputation, deservedly or not, for high crime against persons, drug involvement, gangs, knife fights and shootings and so on, and for years, army and police units have focused on east Port of Spain in an attempt to stamp out “crime”. People are still dying there at a high rate, higher than the norm for the country. Central however, is emerging as the SEX crime capital of the country, for crimes against children.
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