Farley again slams officers’ poor response in Angelo case

Stephon Nicholas

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine has again tak­en a dig at the po­lice ser­vice over their han­dling of the in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the death and sus­pect­ed mur­der of two-year-old An­ge­lo To­bias-Plaza.

Dur­ing a ple­nary sit­ting at the As­sem­bly Leg­is­la­ture in Scar­bor­ough yes­ter­day, Au­gus­tine said cops need bet­ter train­ing in han­dling cas­es in­volv­ing crimes against mi­nors.

Au­gus­tine’s com­ments came two days af­ter he said po­lice did not act with the re­quired ur­gency in the first 48 hours af­ter An­ge­lo was re­port­ed miss­ing from his sea­side home at Cam­bridge Trace, Good­wood.

An­ge­lo’s dis­ap­pear­ance trig­gered a mul­ti-agency re­sponse, which has yet to re­cov­er the child’s body. On Sat­ur­day, An­ge­lo’s step­fa­ther Shan­non Miller was charged for his mur­der. Po­lice re­leased An­ge­lo’s moth­er, Kali­fah To­bias, who had been de­tained since May 15, along with Miller.

At yes­ter­day’s sit­ting, the con­tri­bu­tions of all as­sem­bly­men fo­cused on the pro­tec­tion of chil­dren. While list­ing ini­tia­tives of his ad­min­is­tra­tion to em­pow­er young peo­ple, Au­gus­tine said polic­ing on the is­land must al­so im­prove.

“The TTPS must al­so un­der­go se­ri­ous ca­pac­i­ty train­ing in learn­ing how to in­ves­ti­gate crimes against chil­dren and crimes com­mit­ted with­in house­holds. The THA is pre­pared to fund such sup­port for the TTPS,” he said.

The Par­latu­vi­er/L’anse Four­mi/Spey­side rep­re­sen­ta­tive said polic­ing is more than cars, guns and po­lice sta­tions.

“Peo­ple must feel the pres­ence of the TTPS, and peo­ple must have no ques­tion about the in­tegri­ty of of­fi­cers in­ves­ti­gat­ing cas­es in To­ba­go,” he said.

Au­gus­tine said An­ge­lo’s death has forced To­ba­go to look in the mir­ror about what kind of so­ci­ety it has be­come.

“We are not per­fect peo­ple. We have had vi­o­lence. We have had do­mes­tic abuse. We have had mur­ders. We have had ne­glect. We have even had grave sex­u­al abus­es against our chil­dren. Some of those per­pe­tra­tors have been revered lead­ers in our so­ci­ety — in­clud­ing in this very house in the past.

“But there must be a point where so­ci­ety comes to terms with its se­cret sins and seeks jus­tice. That in­flec­tion point is now.”

He said the THA will en­gage po­lice about en­hanced com­mu­ni­ty polic­ing ini­tia­tives around schools, trans­porta­tion routes and vul­ner­a­ble com­mu­ni­ties. He said the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of vul­ner­a­ble chil­dren must be done ear­li­er and a na­tion­al con­ver­sa­tion must be held about fam­i­ly life, mas­culin­i­ty, par­ent­ing cul­ture, en­ter­tain­ment cul­ture and schools.

Au­gus­tine said Gov­ern­ment pro­grammes can­not bridge the gap of a so­ci­ety that re­fus­es col­lec­tive re­spon­si­bil­i­ty.

Fam­i­lies col­laps­ing be­hind closed doors, says Tourism Sec­re­tary

Tourism Sec­re­tary Zor­isha Hack­ett said too many chil­dren are not be­ing al­lowed to ful­fil their po­ten­tial. Hack­ett al­so ex­tend­ed con­do­lences to sev­en-year-old An­gel­i­ca Jo­gie, who was killed on April 8 when a jet ski struck her while she was at Pi­geon Point beach with her fam­i­ly.

She al­so called for a na­tion­al dis­cus­sion around the pro­tec­tion of chil­dren. Hack­ett called for a stronger safe­ty net, adding that over­whelmed fam­i­lies are col­laps­ing be­hind closed doors.

Deputy Chief Sec­re­tary Dr Faith Breb­nor said vi­o­lence against chil­dren must be treat­ed as a pub­lic health con­cern.

“The ev­i­dence con­tin­ues to show us that child­hood trau­ma leaves marks that ex­tend far be­yond child­hood. Chil­dren ex­posed to vi­o­lence are more like­ly to strug­gle with men­tal health chal­lenges, ed­u­ca­tion dis­rup­tion, chron­ic ill­ness and dif­fi­cul­ties lat­er in life.”

Breb­nor said state in­ter­ven­tion is nec­es­sary be­fore cri­sis un­folds.

“Par­ents are stressed. Care­givers are tired. Peo­ple are nav­i­gat­ing pres­sures that oth­ers can­not see.

“Recog­nis­ing that re­al­i­ty does not ex­cuse harm, but giv­ing grace al­lows us to ask a dif­fer­ent ques­tion. How do we sup­port fam­i­lies be­fore they break?”

She said her di­vi­sion is be­ing proac­tive in pro­mot­ing health and well­ness at home and in the work­place.

As­sis­tant Sec­re­tary of Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment and So­cial Pro­tec­tion Ack­el Franklyn said com­mu­ni­ty lead­ers are fail­ing so­ci­ety and ig­nor­ing their re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to safe­guard young peo­ple.

Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der and Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro did not re­spond to calls and mes­sages from Guardian Me­dia about Au­gus­tine’s crit­i­cism, nor his of­fer to fund po­lice train­ing.