Police frequencies used to be jammed whenever meetings of the WPA were held and communication equipment examined after the death of Walter Rodney and suspected to have belonged to the party showed the ability to tap into police communications.
Trenton Roach, an electronics devices and communication expert, made the disclosures when he took the stand yesterday before the Commission of Inquiry (COI) into the June 13, 1980 death of WPA Leader Rodney.
The testimony gives further insight into the standoff between the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) and the security forces during the PNC reign.
Roach, who joined the Guyana Police Force (GPF) in December of 1975 and left in May of 2003, had been attached to the Police Communication Branch and had been deemed an expert by the commission after he stated that he had examined hundreds of handheld radios/ walkie-talkies in his career.
Before the commissioners, Roach testified that he had assisted in the investigations surrounding Rodney’s death. He explained that on June 14, 1980, he had been instructed to make his way to the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) headquarters, where he was to meet with then Crime Chief Cecil ‘Skip’ Roberts. There, he was referred to Assistant Superintendent Gentle who showed him some equipment, including three domestic radio sets, a VHF monitor and four handheld radios. The previous evening, he said, he had heard that there had been an explosion and Walter Rodney had allegedly been killed. However, he did not question where the equipment given to him had come from as he performed on a “need to know” basis. He added that his position dictated that he simply take orders from his superiors.
However, he stated that he sensed that the matter was a “high-profile” one.
“Was there any doubt in your mind that these equipment had to do with the death of Dr. Walter Rodney?” lead counsel Glen Hanoman questioned.
“No, I did not make the connection,” Roach responded.
However, his initial view changed as his examination of the equipment began.
According to Roach, the monitor he had been tasked with examining had a note pasted on it with the words, “remember to work on the 14th.” However, the numeral 3 had been pasted over the 4 in the date – an occurrence that caused him to instantly link the equipment with Rodney’s death.
“So I said maybe this was a WPA equipment,” Roach said.
He further said that the police’s frequencies would be “jammed” when there were WPA meetings, a fact that greatly concerned the GPF.
His examination showed that the tuning coils of the domestic radios had been tampered with and, once they were close enough, the radios receive transmission from the police frequencies.
They could not, however, transmit but simply receive.
When questioned why anyone would wish to tamper with such equipment, Roach stated that someone would deliberately do so in an attempt to tune in to a different frequency and listen in.
Roach also tested the handheld radios but was unable to find anything of significance. He explained that this was due to the unavailability of equipment such as a frequency counter and some necessary cables and plugs.
“The handheld radios, I did not complete a fully technical examination,” he said. He went on to say that he was unable to determine information, such as the frequency on which the radios operated, along with their output power. How-ever, the handheld radios were in working order and were receiving the police frequency, he said. They were also capable of transmitting signals.
“It was very serious because we felt that the police transmission was compromised,” Roach said. He added, “It could cost people to lose their lives; we could run right into an ambush.”
He was never able to subsequently find the equipment that he was asked to analyse, he said.
Trigger
When later asked whether he knew if radio signals could be used to trigger explosive devices, Roach replied that he had read in the subsequent years that they indeed could do such a thing. However, he said, he could not explain how it worked because his knowledge was limited to what he read.
Roach was also questioned on claims made in Gregory Smith’s book “Assassination Cry of a Failed Revolution: The Truth about Dr. Walter Rodney’s Death.” Accord-ing to Smith, Rodney had brought three portable walkie-talkies to his home. Upon inspection, he noted that one of the sets had been tampered with.
“Two were of the cheap types sold as toys; the other was a more expensive type, though incomplete,” Smith wrote. He continued, “I also found that someone had removed the specification tags or nameplates from the back of the two portable sets (walkie-talkies). The portable someone had started work on had no back cover. Two of the portable sets (walkie-talkies) had a number written at the back for the specification tag. The numbers of these two portables were two and three. The portable that had no back cover had a tag that indicated it was number one. Each radio set (walkie-talkie) had three channels.”
“Having examined those articles that were given to you on the fourteenth of June, 1980, did you find any of those articles as fitting with this description given by Smith?” attorney Christopher Ram, who represents the WPA before the commission, asked.
“My answer is no,” Roach firmly responded.
Aloof
Meanwhile, Roach stated that he had initially met Smith during a joint course between the army and the police. “He was not a good mixer; kind of an aloof person, so I applied the need-to-know principle,” Roach explained.
He further said in his statement that he later learnt that the equipment he analysed had been removed from a home in Evans Street, Charlestown which belonged to radio broadcast pioneer James Rowe.
“In my introduction to radio, this house was where budding technicians would go for advice. I later heard that Gregory Smith lived there,” Roach said. However, he went on, he never saw Smith at the Charlestown home.
He went on to say that, from his work, he could not say if Rowe actually lived in the home in June, 1980. He further said that he was not asked to check whether Smith had a licence to own a radio set.
According to Roach, no wanted bulletin had been subsequently posted at his base following Rodney’s death – a practice he said was not uncommon in the communication branch; other stations, he said, would post bulletins. He also told the commission that there would be radio communication on the police network for wanted persons. However, up to the time of the 1988 inquest into Rodney’s death, Roach said he never saw any bulletin in any police station in relation to Gregory Smith. He further said that he never heard any broadcasts on the radio that Smith was being sought by the police.
He was also not asked to investigate any material removed from the car in which Rodney died, he added.
Inconsistencies
A number of inconsistencies between statements was also noted during Roach’s time on the stand. His testimony presented yesterday indicated that he had conducted his examination on June 14, 1980, just one day after Rodney’s death. However, a statement produced from the 1988 inquest presented different dates; according to those records, Roach had conducted his exam on June 27, 1980.
Roach objected to the type-written statement allegedly by him and maintained that he had made his statement on June 14. He also noted that the top of the subsequent document was dated June 27 while at the bottom the date was June 30, 1980.
“This is not an accurate reproduction of my statement,” Roach said. He went on, “It would not take me three days to begin a statement and finish it. I was taught in training school that you can’t write two different dates on the same document.”
He could not recall whether during the inquest if he had been shown the typewritten reproduction of his initial statement.
After the commission noted other inconsistencies, counsel Hanoman said, “I think it is quite possible that the typewritten statement is a fraudulent statement that was deliberately produced because not only do we have inaccurate information with mistakes in regards to the dates but also inclusions that were never seen.” He further said, “There are some deliberate distortions and I think the distortions would have to do with the point in time when the police was aware of Gregory Smith. We have evidence that since April the special branch knew of the existence of Smith.”
Roach finished his testimony but is scheduled to make a reappearance to undergo cross-examination by lawyer Andrew Pilgrim, who represents the interest of Rodney’s widow and family. The next sitting will be on Monday.
