Shane Su­perville

Se­nior Re­porter

shane.su­perville@guardian.co.tt

Po­lice in the Port-of-Spain Di­vi­sion say that while they have not record­ed a spe­cif­ic uptick in the num­ber of re­port­ed rob­beries around the Beetham High­way, they are aware of tac­tics be­ing used by crim­i­nals and in­tend to de­ploy more pa­trols to quell fur­ther at­tacks.

In the most re­cent in­ci­dent on Fri­day night, three peo­ple were robbed when they stopped on the east­bound lane of the Beetham High­way af­ter their ve­hi­cle came in­to con­tact with an­oth­er car dri­ven by a ban­dit.

Ac­cord­ing to po­lice, the trio re­port­ed feel­ing their car make con­tact with an­oth­er pass­ing ve­hi­cle.

The dri­ver of the car, re­port­ed­ly drove along­side the vic­tims and de­mand­ed that they pull over, blam­ing them for the col­li­sion.

On park­ing on the shoul­der of the Beetham High­way, the man called out to oth­er ban­dits who beat and robbed the vic­tims, be­fore steal­ing cash, jew­ellery and a cell­phone.

One of­fi­cer in the Port-of-Spain Di­vi­sion said while ban­dits on the Beetham High­way have typ­i­cal­ly thrown de­bris, rub­bish and oth­er items near the shoul­der of the road to try and get dri­vers to stop, this was the first time there was a re­port of a ve­hi­cle be­ing used by ban­dits to get vic­tims to stop.

“We are aware of the in­ci­dent, and I can say that cor­re­spon­dence was had with­in the wider Port-of-Spain Di­vi­sion to in­crease our pres­ence on that stretch of the High­way.

“So, in the not-too-dis­tant fu­ture, we may see some height­ened pa­trols on both the east­bound and west­bound lanes of the high­way to pro­vide some cov­er­age and faster re­sponse times.”

Ac­cord­ing to da­ta com­piled by the po­lice Crime and Prob­lem Analy­sis (CA­PA) branch, in the Port-of-Spain Di­vi­sion alone, there have been 127 rob­beries be­tween Jan­u­ary 1 to June 22 2026.

Of this fig­ure, 13 rob­beries have led to ar­rests and charges and have been con­sid­ered solved.

For the same pe­ri­od in 2025, there were 129 rob­beries, 16 of which were con­sid­ered solved.

Guardian Me­dia sought to con­tact head of the Port-of-Spain Di­vi­sion Snr Supt Ray­mond Thom, for a re­sponse to the in­ci­dent, but re­ceived no re­sponse up to press time.

How­ev­er, re­spond­ing to Guardian Me­dia via What­sApp yes­ter­day, Laven­tille West MP Ka­reem Mar­celle con­demned the rob­bery and as­sault, call­ing for more ser­vices to be of­fered to youth in his com­mu­ni­ty.

“It is there­fore ex­treme­ly un­for­tu­nate to have a very mi­nor part of our com­mu­ni­ty en­gaged in such a dis­turb­ing act. I con­demn this and all types of vi­o­lence.

“I am al­so re­new­ing my call and ad­vo­cat­ing for more op­por­tu­ni­ties for our at-risk youth in our com­mu­ni­ties and con­stituen­cy to min­imise the risks to vi­o­lence.”

Mar­celle added that he felt the “vast ma­jor­i­ty” of Beetham Gar­dens res­i­dents were kind, gen­er­ous and pro­duc­tive, not­ing that many res­i­dents were not crim­i­nals and worked hard through le­git­i­mate means to sup­port them­selves.