DCP Martin: T&T safe despite higher murder rate for January

Shane Su­perville and

Sascha Wil­son

While ac­knowl­edg­ing that the mur­der toll for 2026 is high­er than at the same pe­ri­od last year, Gold Com­man­der for Car­ni­val 2026, Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Suzette Mar­tin, has main­tained Trinidad and To­ba­go re­mains safe for the pub­lic and vis­i­tors.

Speak­ing dur­ing a TTPS me­dia brief­ing on se­cu­ri­ty arrange­ments for this year’s Car­ni­val cel­e­bra­tions yes­ter­day, Mar­tin cit­ed fig­ures show­ing that as of yes­ter­day morn­ing, there were 29 mur­ders record­ed for 2026, com­pared with 25 for the same pe­ri­od in 2025 and 36 in 2024.

De­spite the in­crease, she said a num­ber of an­ti-crime op­er­a­tions were al­ready in mo­tion un­der the TTPS’ Car­ni­val ini­tia­tive, Se­cure the VIBES—Vis­i­bil­i­ty, In­tel­li­gence, Bor­der, En­force­ment and Safe­ty.

Mar­tin said in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to this year’s mur­ders were on­go­ing and ex­pressed con­fi­dence in the work of homi­cide in­ves­ti­ga­tors.

“I want to re­as­sure you that we take all mur­ders and vi­o­lent crimes se­ri­ous­ly, and our of­fi­cers are out­side; they are ful­ly de­ployed,” she said.

“We have high-vis­i­bil­i­ty pa­trols, quick re­ac­tion teams, the Homi­cide Bu­reau, as well as in­tel­li­gence-led op­er­a­tions to pro­tect the pub­lic. I want to re­as­sure the pub­lic that it’s safe to go out and have a good time.”

She added that in­for­ma­tion was still be­ing gath­ered in sev­er­al cas­es, with sus­pects ac­tive­ly be­ing pur­sued.

Mar­tin al­so said the TTPS had met with na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies and Car­ni­val stake­hold­ers to en­sure a co­or­di­nat­ed and rapid re­sponse through­out the cel­e­bra­tions.

Her com­ments came as po­lice con­tin­ued in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to the mur­der of South Oropouche busi­ness­man Vy­nesh Roshan Sookoo, who was shot dead on Thurs­day af­ter­noon.

Po­lice said Sookoo was killed just min­utes af­ter step­ping out of his au­to garage along Mon De­sir Road to meet a “cus­tomer” around 5 pm.

In­ves­ti­ga­tors be­lieve the gun­men were wait­ing in a car, but a mo­tive has not yet been de­ter­mined.

The 44-year-old op­er­at­ed Vyn’s Au­to­Zone, which he opened last year af­ter re­lo­cat­ing his busi­ness from Aripero Vil­lage. He lived at Del­hi Road, Fyz­abad.

Po­lice said Sookoo had been at his busi­ness with his fi­ancée, when he told her he was go­ing to meet a cus­tomer.

Mo­ments lat­er, she heard sev­er­al loud ex­plo­sions and lat­er found him ly­ing on the ground with gun­shot in­juries.

An in­spec­tor who ar­rived at the scene at­tempt­ed CPR, but Sookoo was pro­nounced dead at the scene.

When Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed the area, the busi­ness was closed. Neigh­bours de­scribed Sookoo as qui­et and re­served.

“He was not in­volved in any­thing il­le­gal. This is shock­ing to every­one,” one neigh­bour said.

Mon De­sir coun­cil­lor Deryck Bowrin said he had spo­ken with Sookoo less than two hours be­fore the killing.

Bowrin said he and a friend vis­it­ed the garage around 3.30 pm to dis­cuss ve­hi­cle re­pairs.

De­scrib­ing the mur­der as sense­less, Bowrin said Sookoo was a hum­ble and hard­work­ing man whose fam­i­ly was well re­spect­ed in the com­mu­ni­ty.

While ac­knowl­edg­ing the Gov­ern­ment was “work­ing hard to get so­lu­tions” to the crime sit­u­a­tion, Bowrin said he hoped po­lice would ap­pre­hend those re­spon­si­ble and that Sookoo’s fam­i­ly would re­ceive jus­tice.

Of­fi­cers from the Homi­cide Bu­reau of In­ves­ti­ga­tions, Re­gion Three, are con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

Mean­while, po­lice have as­sured that crime-fight­ing op­er­a­tions out­side of Car­ni­val polic­ing will con­tin­ue un­af­fect­ed.

ACP North-West Garvin Hen­ry said there will be in­creased po­lice pres­ence along Ari­api­ta Av­enue, not­ing its sig­nif­i­cance to Port-of-Spain Car­ni­val and past vi­o­lent in­ci­dents in the area.

On Car­ni­val Tues­day, 2025, Venezue­lan bar­ber Joaquin Irvin May­o­ra was gunned down in St James, af­ter an ar­gu­ment with an­oth­er man out­side a bar dur­ing the Pa­rade of the Bands. Four peo­ple—two men and two women—were al­so wound­ed dur­ing the gun­play.

In 2023, At­i­ba Ro­driguez and an­oth­er man iden­ti­fied on­ly as “Javon” were shot and killed on Ari­api­ta Av­enue on Car­ni­val Sat­ur­day, while a British tourist was wound­ed dur­ing the at­tack.

ACP Hen­ry said, “We took cog­ni­sance of it (the mur­der), and our strat­e­gy would in­clude the ro­bust pres­ence, as we know Ari­api­ta Av­enue forms part of the Mec­ca of Port-of-Spain Car­ni­val.

“Guid­ed by what tran­spired last year, yes, you will see an in­creased pres­ence. I won’t get in­to all of it be­cause it is guid­ed by in­tel­li­gence, but I am sure it is un­like­ly that you will see a re­cur­rence of that type of in­ci­dent.”

Se­nior Su­per­in­ten­dent Christo­pher Pa­ponette, of the East­ern Di­vi­sion, al­so not­ed that crim­i­nals of­ten ex­ploit the height­ened move­ment dur­ing Car­ni­val to traf­fic il­le­gal firearms, drugs, stolen ve­hi­cles and oth­er il­lic­it items. He said po­lice had in­creased pa­trols, mo­bil­i­ty and traf­fic en­force­ment at key gate­ways, as well as in rur­al and coastal ar­eas.

Pa­ponette ac­knowl­edged that some in­di­vid­u­als trav­el be­tween east­ern Trinidad and To­ba­go by boat to com­mit crimes and urged campers to reg­is­ter their plans with near­by po­lice sta­tions to as­sist of­fi­cers in emer­gency re­sponse ef­forts.