TRINIDAD-Former top cop files lawsuit against National Security Minister

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Former police commissioner Gary Griffith has filed a lawsuit against National Security Minister Fitzgerald Hinds, also seeking an injunction preventing the senior government minister or anyone associated with him from speaking, further publishing or making other “similar defamatory” comments about him.

The attorney for Griffith contends that their client had been defamed when Hinds appeared on state-run television station TTT, posted on October 29, 2023, on the TTT Live online platform on Facebook.

“In his interview, the defendant made several defamatory statements concerning the claimant, Mr Gary Griffith, and his functions as police commissioner of Trinidad and Tobago.

“Though the defendant avoided the use of the claimant’s name as he published or caused to be published his defamatory words, the defendant referred to the claimant and the performance of his functions as commissioner of police through the use of direct statements and innuendos,” said the lawsuit that was filed on January 18 this year and served on the minister a day later.

The claim said the words used by Hinds surrounding the policy for issuing firearm user’s licenses (FUL) and published would lead anyone acquainted with Griffith to believe he was the person referred to by Hinds.

“The defendant’s defamatory statements would be interpreted by ordinary reasonable viewers and listeners familiar with the matters in the public domain since August 2021 about the non-renewal of the claimant’s contract as commissioner of police; the three investigations that were initiated by the Government and the Police Service Commission (PSC) into the issue of firearms licenses; the reports in the media and the comments made in the public domain by the Prime Minister and the defendant to conclude that the claimant was the subject of the said defamatory statements and that the said defamatory statements referred to the claimant.

“The defamatory statements of and concerning the claimant contained in the said interview are entirely inaccurate and untrue,” the lawsuit claims, adding that Hinds, as National Security Minister and an attorney, should have been aware his comments amounted to an accusation that Griffith had breached the law in the performance of his functions as commissioner.