Police believe that there may be greater difficulty in nabbing the criminals involved in the setting up of illegal CCTV cameras now that the information has been made public.
That’s the view of the police’s North-Central Division Snr Supt Richard Smith.
A newspaper report on May 11 said that criminal gangs were using illegally set up security cameras to monitor police and civilians. The media house said the information came from an internal memo within the police service.
Smith, in a Newsday report, confirmed cameras were set up on TT Electricity Commission (T&TEC) light poles without its permission at Monte Grande, Tunapuna, and Basanta Trace, John Road. A total of 13 cameras were removed from the former and ten from the latter.
However, he added, he could not understand why the details of such a sensitive investigation were provided to a media house.
“It can really prevent us from getting (nabbing) the people involved because they can move differently now that they know what we know.”
He also slammed claims made by Opposition MP Saddam Hosein at a press conference on Sunday that police discovered a “monitoring hub” for these operations at Bangladesh, St Joseph and that two TV screens showed 62 feeds from different cameras, including some monitoring the St Joseph, Tunapuna and Arouca police stations.
Smith said: “I would know about something like that because that is my division.”
He said it is unclear just how many more of these illegal cameras there are across the country.