Police Complaints Authority (PCA) director David West is urging a teenager who reported that she was raped by a man wearing a police uniform to reach out to the authority.
“PCA has no knowledge of this incident. However, we urge the victim to come to the PCA or contact the PCA to make a complaint,” West said in a messenger after he was contacted for comment on the matter
The assault occurred over the weekend in south Trinidad. The 16-year-old girl was at a bazaar at a primary school around 4 pm on Saturday when a man dressed in a police uniform approached and spoke with her.
Two hours later, he returned in a car and dressed in the police uniform pants and a T-shirt and offered to take the teenager for something to eat. She agreed.
He then took the teen to a secluded area where he had sex with her in the car. Afterwards, the suspect dropped the teenager at a junction in Moruga.
Sometime after 10 pm, the girl’s mother took her to the Moruga Police Station to make a report. A female officer then accompanied the girl and her mother to the Princes Town Health Facility where she was medically examined.
Contacted about whether the suspect was, in fact, an officer and whether he was detained, TTPS public relations officer ASP Joanne Archie said the report had just come to her knowledge, and she would inquire further. However, up to late yesterday she had not provided any additional information.
The Moruga police forwarded the report to the Child Protection Unit.
Attempts to contact Police Commissioner Erla Harewood-Christopher and Professional Standards Bureau head Snr Supt Suzette Martin were unsuccessful.
