Minister loses gun permit but keeps gun

A senior Cabinet minister has lost his gun permit but has quietly been allowed to keep his gun.

According to information, the minister who was reappointed in a new portfolio a few months ago when Prime Minister Patrick Manning reshuffled his Cabinet, reported to a senior police officer that his permit was lost somewhere between Trinidad and Tobago about two weeks ago. The officer took the information in confidence and promised to make an investigation, but refused to keep the gun. Junior officers were also warned about giving out the relevant information.

When Newsday spoke to a junior officer he said, “This is wrong, if a lesser person did that they would have been arrested for illegal possession, or the gun would have been taken away. “The fact that the person is a minister does not make it right.” Efforts to contact both the Minister and ACP Oswyn Allard (Anti-crime and Operations) were futile.