Police Assoc declares war on PCA head

Seales’ declaration to his membership to withhold their cooperation with the PCA while West remains as the Authority’s director, came after a Portof- Spain Magistrate dismissed charges laid against one of the Association’s trustees, Inspector Ian Carty, who was accused of failing to provide documents on last year’s “Day of Total Policing”, on March 23, to the PCA.

Seales and Carty, who spoke after Senior Magistrate Gail Gonzales gave her decision in the Port-of-Spain Magistrates Court yesterday, called for the revocation of West’s appointment as the PCA’s director.

Speaking to the media, a defiant Seales said, “He is not going to sit easy because every member of this Police Service, I now decree, will not cooperate with Mr West because it is not in your best interest.

“The PCA under his current leadership cannot function, if we do not cooperate,” Seales declared.

“My decree is, that every single member, to turn your back on Mr West.

“When his investigators come, you will not cooperate voluntarily or otherwise. It is a very serious issue for us.

“He is biased... He is not impartial...and he is reckless in terms of the use of his powers,” Seales advised his membership.

He also again insisted that the police had nothing to do with the events of March 23, 2015. “The Joint Select Committee also said the same thing,” he reiterated.

“We are not a public body but we still, in the spirit of cooperation, provided all the documents,” Seales said.

He added that even if government fails to take action, they intend to write to the President seeking to have West’s appointment revoked.

Gonzales, in ruling on a no-case submission advanced by Carty’s attorneys, held that the PSWA was not a public body which could be called on to provide documents.

She further held that there was no evidence against the association’s trustee.

Speaking after the magistrate’s decision, Carty said the PCA’s director should have been more circumspect in bringing the charges.

“There was not one scintilla of evidence to justify the charges brought against me,” he said, adding that West had impugned his own competence, integrity and ability to sit as the director of the PCA.

“His latest blunder was deeming the Police Service a ‘gang,’” Carty said.