Relief for Sabita’s son

Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­[email protected]

A 38-year-old woman and 17-year-old son re­main in po­lice cus­tody, as of­fi­cers try to piece to­geth­er the cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing the al­leged abuse and false im­pris­on­ment of Sabi­ta Bas­deo.

And as Bas­deo was with fam­i­ly mem­bers re­cov­er­ing last night, her hus­band and son are try­ing to heal af­ter years of sep­a­ra­tion.

In an emo­tion­al in­ter­view at his Ram­lal Av­enue, Bar­rack­pore home yes­ter­day, Bas­deo’s 17-year-old son said he was hap­py to have his moth­er back in their lives, but he was al­so heart­bro­ken over the suf­fer­ing she al­leged­ly en­dured at the hands of a Pe­nal woman and her son. His name was with­held be­cause of his age.

His fa­ther, Kr­ishen­deo, 56, was al­so moved to tears.

Bas­deo’s al­leged abuse came to light on so­cial me­dia, prompt­ing pub­lic con­cern and swift po­lice ac­tion. Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­is­ter Gue­var­ro sub­se­quent­ly mo­bilised a team of of­fi­cers to lo­cate her on Sat­ur­day.

Hours lat­er, the woman and son ar­rived at the Bar­rack­pore Po­lice Sta­tion with Bas­deo. She was tak­en for med­ical treat­ment and then tak­en to the home of a rel­a­tive. Po­lice said she would be tak­en to a “safe place,” but one of Bas­deo’s rel­a­tives yes­ter­day told Guardian Me­dia that she was still at their home and was re­cov­er­ing well.

When his moth­er left sev­er­al years ago, her son said they be­lieved she had sim­ply gone to do do­mes­tic work at the woman’s house. Bas­deo, 42, has one oth­er son who is 14 years old.

De­scrib­ing the mo­ment he saw his moth­er on Sat­ur­day night af­ter years apart, he said, “It was so good. When she saw me, she hugged me. She asked for my broth­er. He was out­side the sta­tion and didn’t get to come in­side.”

He said he was al­so re­lieved that his moth­er was safe.

“I feel bet­ter see­ing she, know­ing she will be out of there. I know no­body will be beat­ing she, do­ing she noth­ing. She will be bet­ter and mak­ing she self stronger now.”

The teen said he and his 14-year-old broth­er had missed their moth­er deeply, but their fa­ther tried his best to care for them. He ex­plained that they were un­aware of the cir­cum­stances she was al­leged­ly en­dur­ing.

“We thought she went to work, do­ing house­work. Not know­ing that she was be­ing abused and peo­ple were tak­ing ad­van­tage of her, not get­ting paid for the sev­en years she was there.”

He al­so claimed he and his fa­ther were al­leged­ly at­tacked when they went to the house where Bas­deo was be­ing kept.

“On two oc­ca­sions, my fa­ther went there, and they beat him. Then about a month ago, I went there with a man to pick up some ma­nure, and when she saw me, she hit me a slap on my back and run me out from she place. I left.”

He said he on­ly be­came aware of the ex­tent of the al­leged abuse about a month ago, when some­one who used to stay at the house sent him two videos. He said they con­tact­ed a lawyer, who in­formed the po­lice. He said no one de­serves what was done to his moth­er, and he is hop­ing that those re­spon­si­ble are charged and im­pris­oned.

Bas­deo re­port­ed­ly told po­lice that be­tween Sep­tem­ber 2025 and April 2026, she was forced to per­form do­mes­tic du­ties while be­ing pre­vent­ed from leav­ing. Dur­ing that pe­ri­od, she al­leged she was beat­en, had her head slammed against a wall, was burned about the body and sub­ject­ed to oth­er forms of abuse, in­clud­ing threats that she would be killed if she tried to es­cape.

Trinidad and To­ba­go Red Cross So­ci­ety vice pres­i­dent Ed­ward Mood­ie had said he be­came aware of Bas­deo’s sit­u­a­tion af­ter see­ing the video on so­cial me­dia. The video al­so showed an­oth­er in­ci­dent in­volv­ing an el­der­ly man who had al­so been beat­en by the sus­pects. Mood­ie al­so con­tact­ed Bas­deo’s fam­i­ly and met with her hus­band and two sons.

While the sus­pects re­main in cus­tody, the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice’s Vic­tim and Wit­ness Sup­port Unit is con­tin­u­ing to in­ter­view wit­ness­es.

At­tempts to reach Min­is­ter of So­cial De­vel­op­ment Van­dana Mo­hit, for­mer min­is­ter Don­na Cox and the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro on the case yes­ter­day were un­suc­cess­ful.

De­scrib­ing as “deeply con­cern­ing,” re­ports of pro­longed abuse suf­fered by Bas­deo, psy­chol­o­gist Dr Var­ma Deyals­ingh yes­ter­day said they re­flect a pro­longed pat­tern of se­vere psy­cho­log­i­cal trau­ma con­sis­tent with co­er­cive con­trol abuse.

He ex­plained that re­cov­ery from pro­longed trau­ma is not im­me­di­ate, so vic­tims would re­quire sus­tained men­tal health sup­port over months or years.

“Such cas­es un­der­score the im­por­tance of ear­ly in­ter­ven­tion, com­mu­ni­ty aware­ness, and co­or­di­nat­ed in­sti­tu­tion­al re­sponse to pre­vent pro­longed abuse and its dev­as­tat­ing men­tal health con­se­quences,” Deyals­ingh said.

He said peo­ple who have been sub­ject­ed to chron­ic phys­i­cal vi­o­lence, with threats to their lives, so­cial iso­la­tion and forced labour over an ex­tend­ed pe­ri­od are at risk for Post-Trau­mat­ic Stress Dis­or­der (PTSD). He ex­plained that symp­toms may in­clude in­tru­sive mem­o­ries or flash­backs, night­mares, hy­per­vig­i­lance, emo­tion­al numb­ness and an ex­ag­ger­at­ed star­tled re­sponse. He said she may al­so ex­pe­ri­ence pro­found anx­i­ety, de­pres­sion, feel­ings of help­less­ness, and loss of trust in oth­ers.

Hu­mil­i­a­tion and degra­da­tion, Deyals­ingh said, can dam­age a per­son’s sense of iden­ti­ty and self-worth. He said vic­tims of­ten de­vel­op what is known as “learned help­less­ness,” where they feel un­able to es­cape or change their sit­u­a­tion, even when op­por­tu­ni­ties arise.

“Cog­ni­tive ef­fects such as dif­fi­cul­ty con­cen­trat­ing, con­fu­sion and im­paired de­ci­sion-mak­ing are al­so com­mon. In ad­di­tion, there is the like­li­hood of de­vel­op­ing a ma­jor de­pres­sive dis­or­der, giv­en the re­port­ed iso­la­tion, abuse, and de­pri­va­tion,” Deyals­ingh said.

Deyalaingh ex­plained that vic­tims may al­so ex­pe­ri­ence grief and emo­tion­al dis­tress re­lat­ed to sep­a­ra­tion from their fam­i­ly. He added that phys­i­cal abuse and tor­ture may fur­ther con­tribute to so­mat­ic symp­toms—chron­ic pain, fa­tigue, and oth­er stress-re­lat­ed med­ical con­di­tions.

He said Bas­deo re­quires im­me­di­ate psy­chi­atric as­sess­ment to as­sess for PTSD, de­pres­sion and anx­i­ety, while steps must be tak­en to en­sure she is in a safe, sup­port­ive en­vi­ron­ment, in­clud­ing re­as­sur­ance of her safe­ty. Once sta­ble, he said trau­ma-fo­cused psy­chother­a­py, Cog­ni­tive Be­hav­iour­al Ther­a­py (TF-CBT) or Eye Move­ment De­sen­si­ti­sa­tion and Re­pro­cess­ing (EM­DR) may al­so be ben­e­fi­cial.

He said phar­ma­co­log­i­cal sup­port med­ica­tion, so­cial and re­ha­bil­i­ta­tive sup­port, as­sis­tance with hous­ing, le­gal doc­u­men­ta­tion, fi­nan­cial sup­port and rein­te­gra­tion in­to so­ci­ety may al­so be nec­es­sary.