TTPS probes authenticity, origin of beheading video

An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­[email protected]

The T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) is ap­peal­ing to the pub­lic for help, which could as­sist of­fi­cers in de­ter­min­ing the lo­ca­tion and au­then­tic­i­ty of a video in which sev­er­al men were record­ed de­cap­i­tat­ing an uniden­ti­fied man in a forest­ed area

In re­sponse to ques­tions re­gard­ing the dis­turb­ing video that sur­faced on so­cial me­dia yes­ter­day, Snr Supt, East­ern Di­vi­sion, Christo­pher Pa­ponette, ac­knowl­edged the sig­nif­i­cant pub­lic con­cern the graph­ic video had gen­er­at­ed.

In a re­lease via the TTPS Cor­po­rate Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Unit yes­ter­day, he as­sured, “The footage, which ap­pears to de­pict a vi­o­lent as­sault in­volv­ing mul­ti­ple male in­di­vid­u­als in a heav­i­ly veg­e­tat­ed area, is be­ing treat­ed with the ut­most se­ri­ous­ness.”

He added, “Giv­en the dis­turb­ing na­ture of the ma­te­r­i­al, the TTPS is con­duct­ing a care­ful and co­or­di­nat­ed as­sess­ment of the video, in­clud­ing its ori­gin, au­then­tic­i­ty, lo­ca­tion, and the time frame in which it may have been record­ed.”

Un­able to con­firm the lo­ca­tion of the in­ci­dent or state with cer­tain­ty whether it oc­curred in Matelot, Sans Souci, To­co, Va­len­cia, or any oth­er dis­trict, Pa­ponette said, “No time­line has yet been es­tab­lished, and the iden­ti­ty of the per­son shown in the video re­mains un­con­firmed.”

De­spite this, he said of­fi­cials from the East­ern Di­vi­sion (ED), in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Homi­cide Bu­reau of In­ves­ti­ga­tions (HBI) and the Cy­ber Crime and So­cial Me­dia Unit, were ac­tive­ly pur­su­ing all avail­able lines of in­quiry.

He added that in­ves­ti­ga­tors were re­view­ing rel­e­vant in­tel­li­gence, ex­am­in­ing re­ports of miss­ing per­sons, and as­sess­ing all in­for­ma­tion re­ceived in or­der to de­ter­mine whether the video is linked to any re­port­ed or un­re­port­ed of­fence.

“The TTPS is deeply con­cerned by the graph­ic and bru­tal na­ture of the im­ages be­ing shared on­line,” Pa­ponette stat­ed.

He ad­vised, “Such ma­te­r­i­al can have a trau­mat­ic ef­fect on mem­bers of the pub­lic, par­tic­u­lar­ly fam­i­lies of miss­ing per­sons, and may al­so in­ter­fere with in­ves­tiga­tive ef­forts.”

As such, he cau­tioned, “The pub­lic is there­fore strong­ly ad­vised not to cir­cu­late, re­post, or spec­u­late about the con­tents of the video.”

And he ap­pealed to mem­bers of the pub­lic who may have in­for­ma­tion re­lat­ing to this mat­ter, in­clud­ing in­for­ma­tion con­cern­ing the iden­ti­ty of any per­sons de­pict­ed, the lo­ca­tion of the in­ci­dent, or the move­ment of sus­pects, to con­tact any ED Po­lice Sta­tion, the HBI, the Cy­ber Crime and So­cial Me­dia Unit, Crime Stop­pers at 800-8477, the TTPS Hot­line, or any po­lice sta­tion na­tion­wide.

Pa­ponette guar­an­teed, “All in­for­ma­tion re­ceived will be treat­ed in the strictest con­fi­dence.

“The TTPS un­der­stands the pub­lic’s de­mand for trans­paren­cy and time­ly in­for­ma­tion. How­ev­er, in mat­ters of this na­ture, it is es­sen­tial that in­ves­tiga­tive in­tegri­ty, le­gal fair­ness, and op­er­a­tional con­fi­den­tial­i­ty be pre­served so that en­quiries are not com­pro­mised and ev­i­dence is not prej­u­diced.”

Pa­ponette said the TTPS was com­mit­ted to iden­ti­fy­ing any vic­tim in­volved, es­tab­lish­ing the facts sur­round­ing this in­ci­dent, and bring­ing any of­fend­er be­fore the courts in ac­cor­dance with the law.