We target criminals

STACY MOORE

Mayaro police officers are not targeting Muslims, but criminals.

So said senior police officers yesterday, in light of comments posted on social media and a media statement from Islamic Front (IF) whose leader Umar Abdullah said the homes of certain Muslims in Mayaro were being targeted by the police. He said during a police exercise in Union Village, Mayaro, several homes were searched by police using sniffer dogs.

However, a senior officer told Sunday Newsday yesterday, “There were exercises in the Mayaro district, and if Muslims, as he (Abdullah) say, homes were searched, it was a pure coincidence. We in the police service don’t target Muslims; we target criminals.” He said anti-crime exercises throughout the community were normal police work in order to weed out the criminal elements. He assured the Mayaro community that any accusation of the police targeting members of the Muslim community was not true.

Several anti-crime exercises were conducted in different parts of Mayaro yesterday morning. But Abdullah said sniffer dogs were used without search warrants to search the homes of Muslims in Union Village.

He also said his organisation was informed that “apparently only Muslim homes are being targeted or perhaps, they are the main subject of their searches.”

The media release from Abdullah stated, “Waajihatul Islaamiyyah (The Islamic Front) is deeply concerned about this and fears that this course of action by the Trinidad and Tobago Police Service will evolve into a negative fallout and another blow at the TTPS’ attempts to rebuild public confidence.”

The release requested that acting Commissioner of Police Stephen Williams give an explanation as to why upstanding and law-abiding citizens were targeted and oppressed. Abdullah said there were situations where an officer’s powers of search and seizure might arise in effecting an arrest and conducting a search. The only legal way to search one’s premises, he said, is with a search warrant or the express permission of the owner.