JENSEN LA VENDE

Se­nior Re­porter

jensen.lavende@guardian.co.tt

Al­leged mur­der con­spir­a­tor Star Sab­ga has fi­nal­ly heard the leaked au­dio record­ing of an al­leged tele­phone con­ver­sa­tion be­tween her­self and her for­mer co-ac­cused, Genevieve Hadeed, po­lice sources have con­firmed.

Sab­ga, Hadeed and Hadeed’s hus­band, Do­minic Hadeed, were de­tained in con­nec­tion with an al­leged plot to mur­der Gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials, in­clud­ing Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and placed un­der Pre­ven­tive De­ten­tion Or­ders (PDOs) at the Gold­en Grove Prison in Arou­ca on June 27.

While Sab­ga re­mains un­der house ar­rest as part of her lat­est PDO stip­u­la­tions, how­ev­er, the or­ders against the Hadeeds were re­voked by Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der on Ju­ly 23.

Alexan­der said he dis­con­tin­ued the or­ders for the Hadeeds af­ter re­view­ing the le­gal, med­ical and con­sti­tu­tion­al is­sues sur­round­ing the cou­ple’s de­ten­tion, while main­tain­ing that the crim­i­nal in­ves­ti­ga­tion re­mains ac­tive.

Against that back­drop, Sab­ga’s at­tor­neys have been seek­ing ac­cess to the al­leged record­ing as they pre­pare her de­fence.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, po­lice sources con­firmed that Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro grant­ed per­mis­sion for elec­tron­ic de­vices to be tak­en to Sab­ga’s Re­gent Tow­er, West­moor­ings home so she could lis­ten to the au­dio record­ing.

The Com­mis­sion­er’s po­si­tion was ac­tu­al­ly out­lined in a doc­u­ment dat­ed Au­gust 19, which formed part of a pre-ac­tion pro­to­col let­ter sent by Gue­var­ro to Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day in ref­er­ence to a sto­ry on the Sab­ga mat­ter.

In the cor­re­spon­dence, Gue­var­ro com­plained he had been sub­ject­ed to ridicule in an ar­ti­cle pub­lished in the T&T Guardian on Au­gust 19, head­lined “Star seeks ur­gent care,” which high­light­ed re­peat­ed re­quests by Sab­ga’s at­tor­neys for her to get ac­cess to med­ical treat­ment.

Ac­cord­ing to a sep­a­rate let­ter dat­ed Au­gust 21, Gue­var­ro stat­ed that Sab­ga had been ex­am­ined by Dr Jacque­line Pereira-Sab­ga on Au­gust 17.

In an ar­ti­cle pub­lished on Au­gust 20, head­lined “Sab­ga’s lawyers seek fam­i­ly vis­its, med­ical ac­cess,” the T&T Guardian re­port­ed that Sab­ga had been seen by a doc­tor but did not spec­i­fy the date of the con­sul­ta­tion.

At­tached to the CoP’s cor­re­spon­dence was a let­ter from Sab­ga’s at­tor­ney, Car­lon Mc Leod, dat­ed Au­gust 19, re­quest­ing per­mis­sion to take elec­tron­ic de­vices to Sab­ga so she could hear the record­ing which forms the ba­sis for the con­spir­a­cy case against her.

“While our client was de­tained at the Women’s Prison, her at­tor­neys-at-law were not per­mit­ted to car­ry a lap­top com­put­er or cel­lu­lar tele­phone in­to the prison. She has not heard those snip­pets, con­ver­sa­tions or en­tries and there­fore can­not be giv­en in­struc­tions from which they were tak­en. In­struc­tions can­not be com­plet­ed un­til she has,” Mc Leod wrote.

He not­ed that the con­di­tions of Sab­ga’s house ar­rest, im­posed by High Court Judge Jus­tice Vigel Paul on Ju­ly 27, pro­hib­it her from com­mu­ni­cat­ing with any­one with­out au­tho­ri­sa­tion and re­quire her to sur­ren­der all com­mu­ni­ca­tion de­vices.

Mc Leod’s let­ter fur­ther stat­ed: “The lap­top or oth­er de­vice will be brought and re­moved by the at­tor­ney-at-law to­geth­er with any ear­phones, if re­quired by the of­fi­cers on du­ty. At­ten­dance will be su­per­vised by our client’s at­tor­neys-at-law at all times dur­ing com­mu­ni­ca­tion with our client, and it will not be used by her as a means of com­mu­ni­ca­tion. At­ten­dance will take place with­in the sight but not the hear­ing of an of­fi­cer, as we have al­ready con­firmed and will abide.”

Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands that while Sab­ga’s ini­tial re­ac­tion to hear­ing what is al­leged to be her voice on the record­ing was not dis­closed to po­lice, con­cerns were raised about the fact that pri­vate con­ver­sa­tions had been record­ed.

As they con­tin­ued prepar­ing her de­fence, Sab­ga’s at­tor­neys sub­se­quent­ly sub­mit­ted an­oth­er re­quest to Gue­var­ro.

In a let­ter dat­ed Au­gust 23, Mc Leod sought per­mis­sion for Com­mis­sion­er of Af­fi­davits Ronal­do Dop­well to vis­it Sab­ga’s home so she could swear a fur­ther af­fi­davit.

“We ac­cord­ing­ly again re­quest your ap­proval for the at­ten­dance of Mr Ronal­do Dop­well, Com­mis­sion­er of Af­fi­davits, to­geth­er with Mr Faris Al-Rawi SC and/or Mrs Mona Na­hous Al-Rawi, and/or Car­lon Mc Leod, at­tor­neys-at-law, up­on our client at 502 Re­gents Tow­er, Re­gents Park, West­moor­ings, for the swear­ing of the fur­ther af­fi­davit. We pro­pose that this at­ten­dance take place on Tues­day, Au­gust 25, 2026, at 12 noon, there­by pro­vid­ing you with am­ple no­tice in re­spect of at­ten­dance.”

The let­ter added: “Giv­en the im­mi­nence of the fil­ing dead­line, we should be grate­ful for your writ­ten con­fir­ma­tion of ap­proval, and that you in­struct, in writ­ing, the of­fi­cers post­ed at our client’s home to fa­cil­i­tate that at­ten­dance at the date and time stat­ed above. We would be oblig­ed for your re­sponse as a mat­ter of ur­gency.”

Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands that both re­quests had been ap­proved up to yes­ter­day.

Sab­ga’s at­tor­neys are prepar­ing her de­fence in a mat­ter ex­pect­ed to be heard in Oc­to­ber, one month af­ter the cur­rent State of Emer­gency is sched­uled to end.