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CCNTV6
  • 11 months ago
President of the Prisons Officers Association Gerard Gordon says his membership is at its wits end as inmates have made good on their threats to come after officers, and officers residences are being shot at, leaving them afraid to home.

More from Tv6's Nicole M Romany.
Transcript
00:00Association President Gerard Gordon says the response from the authorities has
00:05been lukewarm and lacklustre. He adds that many officers are becoming
00:10discouraged and some have mentally divorced themselves from the job. Gordon
00:16tells TV6 the current situation arose after inmates threatened to retaliate if
00:22they were moved from building 13. According to him prison officers are
00:27existing in a state of hopelessness and are fed up. He says the Commission of
00:33Prisons is doing all he can to assist but more is needed from the government.
00:37The Prime Minister would have responded, even the President would have responded
00:41even though those responses were simply an acknowledgement of receipt. The
00:48Minister has not been so kind as to even acknowledge receipt of a number of
00:54letters we would have written. So we continue to see and we would have said
01:00it before in the media is that and I know we in silly season and there's not
01:06anything political we are not political in any way but we were adamant that Mr.
01:14Hines should step aside and they should give us back Stuart Young but we know
01:21Gordon says the Association has been lobbying for legislation to protect
01:26officers but that has fallen on deaf ears. One of the things that we asked for
01:32and to date we have not gotten any movement on is we have asked for the
01:38implementation of a law enforcement officer safety act which would speak it
01:45would show that the state now is intimately involved in managing the
01:50safety of not only prison officers but police officers customs immigration
01:56wherever you have law enforcement who is doing a job and as a result of doing
02:02that that job threats they are given threats what we are seeing is that we
02:08have to put ourselves in a position to protect the protectors. Also speaking
02:13with TV6 was General Secretary Lester Logee who noted the level of danger
02:19officers face daily. He says their lives are constantly at risk. My concern is
02:26that you could always get another job you could always look for another job
02:31but you have one life and that is the reality we are facing now and I mean it
02:43is better to start over than to continue it with this job we are doing
02:47we didn't we didn't come here to we didn't join this work to be gunned down and murdered.
02:52Mr. Logee sought to explain just how dire the reality of the situation is.
02:59We would have lost Mr. Glenford Gardner, a good friend of mine. He's a cockswing on the
03:05boat working Carrera and he lost his life based on a search at Port of Spain where
03:11we took away some phones and they put the phone in his hand to send a message
03:18so when officers seeing that it have officers will turn a blind eye they
03:26would see inmates on their phones and they will turn a blind eye because they
03:30realize I have no support. The Association executives tell TV6 many
03:36officers live in the dormitory which is also in a dilapidated condition because
03:41they fear for their safety. They add that several calls for safe houses have
03:46not yet borne fruit. Nicole M Romany, TV6 News.
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