Top cop on social media threats: ‘Your words today can have you in handcuffs tomorrow’

JENSEN LA VENDE

Se­nior Re­porter

[email protected]

Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro has warned that mak­ing threats on so­cial me­dia is against the law and will not be tol­er­at­ed.

“Your words to­day can have you in hand­cuffs to­mor­row,” he said.

His warn­ing came in a me­dia re­lease yes­ter­day fol­low­ing two high­ly pub­li­cised in­ci­dents in which the lives of the Prime Min­is­ter and Op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor Dr Amery Browne were threat­ened on so­cial me­dia.

Gue­var­ro said: “This be­hav­iour is un­law­ful, dan­ger­ous, and will not be tol­er­at­ed.”

He added that he “has ob­served with se­ri­ous con­cern” an in­crease in so­cial me­dia posts in which peo­ple made threats of vi­o­lence against each oth­er, as well as threats di­rect­ed at pub­lic of­fi­cials.

On Mon­day, a Diego Mar­tin man who al­leged­ly threat­ened to mur­der Op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor Dr Amery Browne was de­tained for ques­tion­ing.

Po­lice said the man was be­ing in­ter­viewed, but did not pro­vide de­tails on when he was de­tained or which unit took him in­to cus­tody. The man is ac­cused of post­ing threat­en­ing mes­sages on Face­book, which Browne re­port­ed to po­lice on Sat­ur­day.

In a Face­book post, Browne wrote: “I have made a full re­port to the Po­lice Ser­vice based on on­line death threats made against me and mem­bers of my fam­i­ly in the form of spe­cif­ic com­ments on my Face­book wall. I have been in­volved in the ac­tive pol­i­tics of Trinidad and To­ba­go since 2007 and have nev­er ex­pe­ri­enced any­thing like this. I am treat­ing the is­sue very se­ri­ous­ly.”

One of the poster’s com­ments read: “Any time I see u pub­lic, I go walk up to yuh and shoot yuh in yuh head.” An­oth­er said: “I go­ing a wait out­side Par­lia­ment when I see yuh I go shoot u.” A third read: “I go send men to kill yuh chil­dren.”

Yes­ter­day, Gue­var­ro said that while he sup­port­ed free­dom of ex­pres­sion as a right and be­lieved cit­i­zens were free to share their thoughts and opin­ions, such free­doms end where crim­i­nal con­duct be­gins.

“No one has the right to in­cite vi­o­lence, in­tim­i­date oth­ers, or use on­line plat­forms to threat­en harm. Such ac­tions un­der­mine pub­lic safe­ty, desta­bilise com­mu­ni­ties, and erode the peace and or­der that cit­i­zens de­serve.”

The Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er added that, in ac­cor­dance with para­graph 2 of the Sched­ule of the Emer­gency Pow­ers Reg­u­la­tions 2025, the min­is­ter re­spon­si­ble for na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty is em­pow­ered to is­sue a Pre­ven­tive De­ten­tion Or­der to any per­son to pre­vent them from act­ing in a man­ner prej­u­di­cial to pub­lic safe­ty.

“This pow­er is ac­ti­vat­ed when in­di­vid­u­als use so­cial me­dia to pub­lish posts or com­ments that in­cite vi­o­lence, in­vite ex­ter­nal in­ter­fer­ence, or oth­er­wise en­dan­ger the safe­ty and sta­bil­i­ty of the na­tion. The TTPS will take de­ci­sive ac­tion. Any in­di­vid­ual who us­es so­cial me­dia or any dig­i­tal plat­form to is­sue threats, en­cour­age vi­o­lence, or en­dan­ger the safe­ty of any per­son, in­clud­ing gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials, will face the full force of the law. Our Cy­ber and So­cial Me­dia Unit con­tin­ues to track these of­fences, and once ev­i­dence is gath­ered, of­fend­ers will be iden­ti­fied, lo­cat­ed, and pros­e­cut­ed,” he stat­ed.

Gue­var­ro urged all cit­i­zens to con­duct them­selves re­spon­si­bly on­line.

“Share your views, raise your con­cerns, and par­tic­i­pate in na­tion­al di­a­logue, but do so with­in the bound­aries of the law. Don’t take chain up from any­one. Your words to­day can have you in hand­cuffs to­mor­row. Words have con­se­quences, and those who choose to threat­en or in­cite vi­o­lence will be held ac­count­able.”

Last week, the de­ten­tion of Olive Green-Jack was gazetted. The or­der, made on 12 No­vem­ber, stat­ed that Green-Jack should be held for her so­cial me­dia post.

The or­der said that Green-Jack, of Diego Mar­tin, “made and pub­lished pub­lic posts and/or com­ments on so­cial me­dia ad­dressed to the Venezue­lan gov­ern­ment in an at­tempt to in­flu­ence pub­lic opin­ion in a man­ner like­ly to be prej­u­di­cial to pub­lic safe­ty.”

It added that the posts and com­ments in­vit­ed vi­o­lence against the Prime Min­is­ter, the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go, and mem­bers of the pub­lic by Venezuela and/or ex­ter­nal per­sons, which re­vealed “an im­mi­nent threat to pub­lic safe­ty.”

Green-Jack is be­ing held at the Women’s Prison un­til Feb­ru­ary next year.

Gue­var­ro’s warn­ing about so­cial me­dia comes as Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der said he would write to the Charge d’Af­faires of the US Em­bassy, Dr Jenifer Nei­d­hart de Or­tiz, sug­gest­ing that the US gov­ern­ment re­voke the visas of US-based so­cial me­dia users who spread “pro­pa­gan­da and fear” and “place our se­cu­ri­ty forces at risk.”

Alexan­der al­so sug­gest­ed greater polic­ing of so­cial me­dia posts, cit­ing Chi­na as an ex­am­ple.