Security personnel not allowed to
carry prison firearms, unions say
~ After meeting with public prosecutor ~
PHILIPSBURG--The Prosecutor’s Office has promised the prison guards that private security personnel no longer will be allowed to walk around armed with prison regulation firearms at the Pointe Blanche prison. The unions ABVO and WICSU representing the prison guards met with Chief Prosecutor Taco Stein yesterday to discuss complaints brought forward by the prison guards about this matter.
ABVO coordinator in the Windward Islands Antonio Janga told The Daily Herald the prison guards were threatened by the situation at the Pointe Blanche prison. Private security personnel from the company Check-mate were working alongside the prison guards carrying firearms.
“We don’t know who they are, if they reside legally on the island, if they were psychologically tested or had training to carry firearms. Yet they have been walking around carrying prison regulation firearms. But the prosecutor promised us that these situations will not take place again at the prison,” Janga said.
According to him, prison director Rudsel Ricardo violated the law on firearms. “This law gives Ricardo the authority to give prison guards firearms to work with. But he has no authority to give these firearms to the Check-Mate Security personnel,” he said.
According to Janga, no further investigation by the Prosecutor’s Office will take place on the matter. “We have no intention of pursuing the director’s dismissal. We want to maintain calm at the prison and together with the prison director solve the problems prison guards encounter.”
WICSU president William Reed also said the talks with Stein had been very positive. “The talks proved that the actions taken by prison management, to let private security personnel walk around with firearms and even take shooting practice with the arms, was against the law on firearms,” he said.
Reid believed that it had been proven that Ricardo had no knowledge of the law on firearms and that after he took certain actions he had checked back and realised he had done wrong.
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