Kidnappers reduce ransom to TT$100,000 for release of Tardieu couple

JENSEN LA VENDE

Se­nior Re­porter

[email protected]

Less than a week af­ter kid­nap­pers de­mand­ed US$2.5 mil­lion for the re­lease of cou­ple Der­rick and Clari­bel Tardieu, their kid­nap­pers have re­port­ed­ly agreed to re­duce the amount to $100,000, se­nior po­lice of­fi­cers said yes­ter­day.

The re­duc­tion in the ran­som is the lat­est de­vel­op­ment in the case, po­lice sources told Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day.

Tardieu, 70, a busi­ness­man, and his 47-year-old wife were snatched from their Blanchette Bay, Monos Is­land home on De­cem­ber 6.

A fam­i­ly friend sub­se­quent­ly re­ceived a dis­tress­ing voice note from a cell­phone with a Colom­bian reg­is­tra­tion num­ber around 9.44 pm, in­form­ing them of the kid­nap­ping. The mes­sage, which came from Der­rick Tardieu, said, “Dey have meh and want 2.5 mil­lion US for meh re­lease.”

A video was lat­er re­leased show­ing the cou­ple with guns point­ed at their heads and some­one hold­ing a grenade close to them, as Tardieu plead­ed with rel­a­tives in Span­ish to pay the ran­som.

Yes­ter­day, the po­lice source said of­fi­cers had con­duct­ed sev­er­al search­es for the cou­ple on both the main­land and Down the Is­lands since they were snatched.

It was al­so re­port­ed yes­ter­day that rel­a­tives had re­ceived a proof of life from the kid­nap­pers, but Guardian Me­dia could not con­firm this.

To­day marks sev­en days since the Tardieu’s were grabbed from their Monos Is­land home by their kid­nap­pers. The in­ci­dent has sparked fresh pub­lic con­cern about the ease with which kid­nap­pers have been able to tar­get their vic­tims this year.

When asked for an up­date on the in­ves­ti­ga­tion yes­ter­day, Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro said he could not speak on the kid­nap­ping, as the mat­ter “is at a sen­si­tive stage.”

The US$2.5 mil­lion ran­som de­mand was deemed “fishy” by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar on Tues­day.

Re­spond­ing to a ques­tion from Guardian Me­dia be­fore at­tend­ing Par­lia­ment, the Prime Min­is­ter said: “The one at Monos Is­land ap­pears to be very—I don’t want to pro­nounce be­cause the mat­ter will be be­fore the po­lice and the courts, but it’s a bit fishy for some­one to ask for 2.5 mil­lion US dol­lars. So, I guess more in­ves­ti­ga­tions will give us more an­swers. If you are Akash (Sama­roo), or any cit­i­zen, I can’t see them de­mand­ing two mil­lion US dol­lars for you or any one of you here. So, we need to get drilled down in­to it; the po­lice need to do more in­ves­ti­ga­tions.”

Her com­ments brought crit­i­cism from for­mer na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les, who called on Per­sad-Bisses­sar to ex­plain what she meant.

How­ev­er, rel­a­tives of the cou­ple were re­port­ed as say­ing the Prime Min­is­ter’s use of the word “fishy” was just a pun, as the two were grabbed from Monos Is­land. Mean­while, speak­ing with the me­dia at an event at An­gos­tu­ra in Laven­tille yes­ter­day, Min­is­ter of For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Sean Sobers said all re­sources are be­ing utilised to get the Tardieus out of the hands of their kid­nap­pers. “Our hearts con­tin­ue to go out to the fam­i­ly,” Sobers said.

“I am well aware that the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice, the Trinidad and To­ba­go Coast Guard, the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force and oth­er se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies are as­sist­ing in terms of that. There is a lot that is hap­pen­ing, it’s a very dy­nam­ic and flu­id is­sue, and I wouldn’t want to com­ment too much on what is ac­tu­al­ly oc­cur­ring, but it is get­ting the full at­ten­tion of the Gov­ern­ment.”

He added that it was not just this fam­i­ly, but that all crime re­ports are of con­cern to the Gov­ern­ment. He said the Gov­ern­ment takes crime very se­ri­ous­ly and in­tends to treat with it.