Due to an increase in homicides by criminal organizations, Trinidad and Tobago announced a state of emergency on Monday. This decision gives police the authority to make arrests and perform searches without a warrant for the next two days.
“The circumstances warranting the declaration of the public emergency are based on the advice of the Trinidad and Tobago Police Service to the National Security Council of heightened criminal activity which endangers the public safety,” Prime Minister Keith Rowley’s office said in a statement.
The nation saw 61 killings in December, according to Attorney General Stuart Young, increasing the year’s total to 623 homicides from 577 in 2023 and 599 in 2022.
Speaking at a press conference in Spain’s capital, Port, Young stated that in order to lessen the declaration’s negative economic effects, there would be no curfew or restrictions on people’s freedom of movement.
According to Young, a court may grant police officers up to seven days to conduct searches and make arrests without a warrant.
Fitzgerald Hinds, the minister of national security, described the rise in violent killings as “an epidemic” for the 1.4 million-person nation during the same press conference. As of December 26, there had been 551 shootings this year.
A man was shot and murdered on Saturday after leaving a police station in Port of Spain, while five people were slain in a shooting in Laventille, Trinidad, on Sunday.
The same justification led to the declaration of a state of emergency in 2011, albeit it was only applied to “hotspots” of criminal activity.
