Senior police officer vows to end illegal quarrying, go after bad cops

A senior police officer is hopping made over illegal quarrying in Eastern Trinidad and she has pledged to shut down those behind the operations by the end of the year.

Senior Supt Margaret Sampson-Browne told the Trinidad Guardian the problem is affecting legitimate businesses. She said many of them are forced to pay "hefty protection tax".

She also told the paper legal businessmen are also pressured into delivering truckloads of gravel to illegal quarries, in exchange for the safe passage of their vehicles.

Sampson-Browne told the Guardian many of the illegal quarries operate as "ghost companies" to elude detection. She has pledged to shut down the illegal business and also to go after police officers who might be involved in illegal quarrying.

She told the Guardian a special squad of Eastern Division police, working closely with the Criminal Investigations Unit (CIU) and the Anti-Corruption Bureau, has implemented measures to reduce illegal quarrying.

"We are relentlessly collecting data, and by the end of the year there will be a significant decrease in illegal quarrying in Eastern Division, if not before,” Sampson-Browne told the paper.

Sampson-Browne said she inherited the problem when she assumed office last February. She charged that because of the sensitivity of information police are gathering, the people involved are making hasty attempts to "cover up" their activities.

"We have the names of people who are said to be extorting money from legal businessmen," she said, adding that the information includes names of police officers reportedly linked to illegal quarrying.

And she said she's not going to protect anyone. "I am not going to hold a candle for anybody. There are names of police officers we are aware of and we are addressing that situation," Sampson-Browne told the paper.

"I hate a dishonest person. I more so hate a dishonest police officer, because they are not trained to protect and serve persons who are doing wrong things, and illegal quarrying is one of them," she said.

Sampson-Browne called on the community to work with the police to solve the problem. "It has to be a show of force by the police and supportive strength by the community," she said.

Sampson-Browne told the Guardian her officers are willing to "march into hell for a heavenly cause...we are working on the ground and under the ground to bring some measure of relief, because everybody is supposed to exist in an environment that is safe, whether real or perceived.”

The Guardian story did not name any group or organization connected to the illegal operations. But it has posted a comment from a reader that goes into detail about the problem.

Writing under the pen name of the Pilgrim, the reader connected the issue to the Muslimeen group, led by Iman Yasin Abu Bakr.

(We have reprinted the comment from The Pilgrim in the blog entry that follows this story. The Pilgrim's comments are also in the original Guardian story).