Two in­ves­ti­ga­tions are un­der­way in­to the al­leged as­sault of an im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cer by an Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty (AA) se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cer at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port on Tues­day af­ter­noon. 

Po­lice said the im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cer, who su­per­vis­es the 2 pm to 10 pm shift, pre­sent­ed his ID through a glass par­ti­tion, fol­low­ing stan­dard pro­ce­dure. Af­ter com­ply­ing, he re­port­ed­ly turned to leave to take up his shift but the se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cer al­leged­ly fol­lowed him, placed him in a head­lock, and forcibly re­strained him—all in plain sight of scores of trav­ellers.

Im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cials, who spoke with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day on the con­di­tion of anonymi­ty, are now call­ing for CCTV footage to be se­cured and a thor­ough in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the in­ci­dent.

They claimed this in­ci­dent adds to what they de­scribed as an on­go­ing pat­tern of ag­gres­sion from some Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty se­cu­ri­ty per­son­nel. 

A se­nior im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cial, who asked not to be named, said that an­oth­er of­fi­cer—a se­nior Im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cer III—has an ac­tive court case from ear­li­er this year against an Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cer for al­leged as­sault. In that case, the of­fi­cer re­port­ed­ly suf­fered a frac­tured fin­ger and bro­ken nail. Sim­i­lar con­fronta­tions, im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers claimed, have oc­curred at both Pi­ar­co and the South Ter­mi­nal of the old air­port.

“These in­ci­dents are not iso­lat­ed, and our staff in­creas­ing­ly feel un­safe. This hap­pened in front of trav­ellers, yet the re­sponse has been lim­it­ed. We need ac­count­abil­i­ty,” an im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cer said.

Im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers are now threat­en­ing to dis­rupt air­port op­er­a­tions if their con­cerns con­tin­ue to go un­ad­dressed.

The in­ci­dent was re­port­ed to the po­lice, who are in­ves­ti­gat­ing.

The Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty’s cor­po­rate com­mu­ni­ca­tions man­ag­er, Zo­la Joseph yes­ter­day is­sued a brief state­ment con­firm­ing the in­ci­dent. She said a probe was un­der­way.

“Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty of Trinidad and To­ba­go wish­es to con­firm that there was a re­port of an in­ci­dent at Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port on No­vem­ber 12, 2024, in­volv­ing an im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cer and an Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cer. The Au­thor­i­ty has ini­ti­at­ed an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to this mat­ter,” Joseph said.