Monday, February 14, 2011

Vigilante action in Penal raises questions about personal security

Last week two bandits went into a home in Penal and terrorised and robbed a couple and their children, chopping the adults who screamed for help.

Some villagers responded and chased the bandits. One man took his car and ran down the bandits. When police arrived one of the bandits was dead. The villagers had tied up the other and handed him over to police.

Police promptly arrested the man who drove the car that hit the fleeing thieves. And now his wife is pleading with police to release her husband, saying he did nothing wrong. “Release him. He was only defending a family from thieves,” she asked on Sunday after visiting her husband at the Barrackpore Police Station.

Police Commissioner Dwayne Gibbs has said residents should not take the law into their own hands and cautioned against the use of excessive force.

But junior National Security Minister Subhas Panday does not share that view. Panday has said that Trinidad is under siege by the criminals and the time has come for citizens to be given the authority in law, to attack anyone who is attacking them and their property.

The woman claimed that police refused to let her speak with her husband when she delivered his medication for hypertension. Police investigators have said the man is "still assisting in their investigations".

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Jai & Sero

Jai & Sero

Our family at home in Toronto 2008

Our family at home in Toronto 2008
Amit, Heather, Fuzz, Aj, Jiv, Shiva, Rampa, Sero, Jai