Hinds: TTPS in process of seeking advice from DPP on fatal shooting of Venezuelan baby

Hinds gave an up­date on the sta­tus of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the in­ci­dent at sea in­volv­ing the T&T Coast Guard and a Venezue­lan ves­sel that re­sult­ed in the death of the one-year-old on Feb­ru­ary 6, 2022

Gail Alexan­der

The Po­lice Ser­vice has com­plet­ed its in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to an in­ci­dent in­volv­ing the T&T Coast Guard, in which Venezue­lan ba­by Yaelvis San­toyo was fa­tal­ly shot in Feb­ru­ary and the TTPS is in the process of seek­ing ad­vice from the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP).

Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds con­firmed this in Par­lia­ment on Fri­day, while re­ply­ing to Op­po­si­tion ques­tions.

Hinds gave an up­date on the sta­tus of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the in­ci­dent at sea in­volv­ing the T&T Coast Guard and a Venezue­lan ves­sel that re­sult­ed in the death of the one-year-old on Feb­ru­ary 6, 2022.

Hinds said, “Based on in­for­ma­tion re­ceived from the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice, the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the in­ci­dent at sea in­volv­ing the T&T Coast Guard and a Venezue­lan ves­sel on Feb­ru­ary 6, 2022, which re­sult­ed in the death of a ba­by, re­mains on­go­ing.”

In this re­gard, he said the firearms and pro­jec­tile in­volved in the in­ci­dent have since been seized and analysed by the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre.

“Fur­ther, the Po­lice Ser­vice has com­plet­ed its in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the in­ci­dent and is in the process of seek­ing the DPP’s ad­vice,” he said.

Gov­ern­ment House leader Camille Robin­son-Reg­is mean­while drew Op­po­si­tion crit­i­cism when she con­firmed no tech­ni­cal of­fi­cers from the En­er­gy Min­istry or oth­er min­istries had ac­com­pa­nied the Prime Min­is­ter on his re­cent of­fi­cial vis­it to Switzer­land.

“How­ev­er, the Min­is­ter of En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries, who was briefed by of­fi­cials of his min­istry, ac­com­pa­nied the Prime Min­is­ter,” she added.

On re­cent na­tion­wide flood­ing over the last 48 hours, Works Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan de­tailed work done on de­silt­ing, pumps and sluice gates. In many cas­es, he said work has to wait un­til wa­ter re­cedes.

Sinanan list­ed ar­eas in Cen­tral, South and East where emer­gency work be­gan on im­pact­ed ar­eas and wa­ter­cours­es in the last 48 hours and re­in­state­ment of in­fra­struc­ture as re­quired.

Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Agri­cul­ture Avinash Singh de­tailed ac­tions to com­bat the Ph­thori­maea/Tu­ta ab­so­lu­ta (leafmin­er) pest first iden­ti­fied in T&T in De­cem­ber 2021 in St George East and West.

“While the pop­u­la­tion is still rel­a­tive­ly low, it’s eas­i­ly spread by move­ment of wind, in­fect­ed fruits, plant­i­ng ma­te­r­i­al and pack­ag­ing ma­te­r­i­al. Plants and fruits af­fect­ed by this are deemed un­mar­ketable and can re­sult in an 80 to 100 per cent yield loss for farm­ers. This pos­es a great threat to our na­tion’s food pro­duc­tion lev­els,” Singh said.

Singh added that the min­istry has em­barked on an ag­gres­sive out­reach pro­gramme to in­form the pub­lic of this new in­sect pest.

“For the plan of ac­tion di­rect­ed to in­fest­ed fields, 800 units of pheromone sup­plies have been pro­cured, to aid in the sur­veil­lance/mon­i­tor­ing and mass trap­ping ac­tiv­i­ties, the min­istry is present­ly await­ing the ar­rival of this ship­ment,” he said.

“Fu­ture ac­tiv­i­ties will in­volve sur­veys/sur­veil­lance and mon­i­tor­ing ac­tiv­i­ties in the fields, im­ple­ment­ing the In­te­grat­ed Pest Man­age­ment con­trol mea­sures and im­ple­ment­ing the Nat­ur­al En­e­my Iden­ti­fi­ca­tion Pro­gramme, a bi­o­log­i­cal con­trol strat­e­gy to de­ter­mine and iden­ti­fy in­dige­nous nat­ur­al en­e­mies of this pest or the im­por­ta­tion of an ex­ot­ic nat­ur­al en­e­my.”