Illegal immigrants and sheep intercepted in Chaguaramas

Eigh­teen for­eign na­tion­als were in­ter­cept­ed by po­lice dur­ing a coastal se­cu­ri­ty op­er­a­tion in Ch­aguara­mas ear­ly Wednes­day morn­ing.

The Coastal and Air Sup­port Unit (CA­SU) in­ter­cept­ed the group around 12:30 am while of­fi­cers were con­duct­ing mo­bile pa­trols along Mac­queripe Road.

Po­lice said the group com­prised sev­en women and 11 men, along with two Trinida­di­an men.

A quan­ti­ty of sheep was al­so seized dur­ing the op­er­a­tion.

The TTPS said the ar­rests and seizure form part of in­ten­si­fied coastal se­cu­ri­ty ini­tia­tives be­ing di­rect­ed by Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (Op­er­a­tions) Suzette Mar­tin and ACP (Tac­ti­cal Sup­port) Col­lis Hazel.

En­quiries are con­tin­u­ing with the sup­port of of­fi­cers from the West­ern Di­vi­sion, Counter Traf­fick­ing Unit, Im­mi­gra­tion Di­vi­sion and Na­tion­al An­i­mal Dis­ease Cen­tre.

The op­er­a­tion was co­or­di­nat­ed by Ag ASP Ron­ny Ram­pal­lard and Ag In­sp Fabi­an Bris­bane, with PCs Tir­ban­ie, Clifton, Alex­is and Fran­cis.

The TTPS said it con­tin­ues to strength­en its pres­ence along the na­tion’s coast­line as part of ef­forts to com­bat il­le­gal firearms, nar­cotics, hu­man traf­fick­ing and oth­er forms of transna­tion­al or­gan­ised crime.