Trinidad Top Cop makes sweeping changes to firearm licence process

(Trinidad Guardian) Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith has made good on his promise to re­vamp the process for ob­tain­ing a firearm user li­cence.

In an­nounc­ing the sweep­ing changes at the week­ly press brief­ing at the Po­lice Ad­min­is­tra­tion Build­ing in Port-of-Spain to­day, Sgt David Swan­son of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) Firearms Sec­tion, sug­gest­ed that they would quick­ly ad­dress the al­most two-decade back­log of ap­pli­ca­tions plagu­ing him and his col­leagues.

“Com­mis­sion­er Grif­fith has seen it fit to take the lead so as to ad­dress the chal­lenges faced by the Firearms Sec­tion by util­is­ing a hands-on ap­proach to ef­fi­cient­ly and ef­fec­tive­ly deal with all ap­pli­ca­tions both cur­rent and pend­ing,” Swan­son said.

Un­der the changes, peo­ple who sub­mit­ted ap­pli­ca­tions be­tween 2004 and 2010 are be­ing asked to pro­vide the unit with up-to-date doc­u­men­ta­tion in­clud­ing cer­tifi­cates of good char­ac­ter, psy­cho­me­t­ric eval­u­a­tions, change of ad­dress and pass­port sized pho­tographs. The in­for­ma­tion is re­quired to be sub­mit­ted to the unit from Feb­ru­ary 1 to Au­gust 31.

Swan­son ex­plained that peo­ple with pend­ing ap­pli­ca­tions made be­fore 2004 would have to reap­ply as the ap­pli­ca­tion forms had been al­tered in that year.

Those who had pre­vi­ous­ly ap­plied and are no longer in­ter­est­ed in ob­tain­ing a li­cence are al­so re­quired to in­form the unit.

Swan­son said in or­der to fast-track the in­ves­ti­ga­tion and ap­proval of ap­pli­cants, Grif­fith pro­vid­ed ad­di­tion­al staff and re­sources to the unit.

“The Firearms Sec­tion has be­come ful­ly com­put­erised and ac­cess to in­for­ma­tion would be lim­it­ed to staff pos­sess­ing the nec­es­sary clear­ance so as to en­able a greater sense of con­fi­den­tial­i­ty,” Swan­son said.

In ad­di­tion to the amend­ments to the ap­pli­ca­tion process, Grif­fith al­so in­creased the lim­it of the am­mu­ni­tion that can be held by a li­cence hold­er from 25 rounds to 40 rounds.

Ex­ist­ing li­cence hold­ers will have to ap­ply to the unit in or­der to vary their li­cence to car­ry the ad­di­tion­al am­mu­ni­tion.

Swan­son called on cit­i­zens who may be ap­proached by cor­rupt po­lice of­fi­cers for bribes to as­sist with the ap­pli­ca­tion process to re­port such in­ci­dents di­rect­ly to Grif­fith.

“The au­thor­i­ty lies sole­ly with the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice and it must be clear­ly stat­ed that there is not a cost at­tached to the ap­pli­ca­tion for and the grant­i­ng of a firearm user li­cence with ex­cep­tion to the an­nu­al li­cence fee,” he said.

Swan­son al­so an­nounced that Grif­fith had de­cid­ed to in­tro­duce new reg­u­la­tions for air ri­fles and oth­er lethal weapons.

Un­der the reg­u­la­tions, on­ly reg­is­tered firearm deal­ers are now per­mit­ted to im­port and re­tail air ri­fles, with im­port li­cences pre­vi­ous­ly grant­ed to in­di­vid­u­als, be­com­ing im­me­di­ate­ly null and void.

“All firearm deal­ers would be re­quired to have strict con­trol over the sales of air ri­fles and prop­er records,” he said, as he not­ed that the Of­fice of the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er must be no­ti­fied of all sales.

Swan­son al­so said that all air ri­fle clubs and as­so­ci­a­tions must be reg­is­tered and au­tho­rised by the po­lice com­mis­sion­er and must have cer­ti­fied range of­fi­cers to com­ply with safe­ty rules set by the Po­lice Train­ing Acad­e­my.

Swan­son said the im­por­ta­tion of cross­bows would be pro­hib­it­ed as he not­ed that Grif­fith was ex­pect­ed to meet with of­fi­cials from the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion to dis­cuss the changes.

Ap­ply­ing for a firearms users li­cence

Un­der the Firearms Act, cit­i­zens and res­i­dents may ap­ply to the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice for a li­cence.

The leg­is­la­tion on­ly re­quires that hold­ers are over the age of 25, have clean crim­i­nal records and do not have “in­tem­per­ate habits or an un­sound mind”. How­ev­er, it gives the com­mis­sion­er pow­er to in­tro­duce ad­di­tion­al re­quire­ments which he may see fit.

Ap­pli­cants must first ap­ply for a pro­vi­sion­al li­cence and un­der­go train­ing with a firearm in­struc­tor be­fore seek­ing the li­cence. Own­ers of se­cu­ri­ty com­pa­nies are al­so per­mit­ted to ap­ply for em­ploy­ee li­cences for their of­fi­cers.

Once grant­ed the com­mis­sion­er may sus­pend or re­voke li­cences of hold­ers, who are con­vict­ed of do­mes­tic vi­o­lence and oth­er crim­i­nal of­fences.

Un­suc­cess­ful ap­pli­cants are per­mit­ted to ap­peal the com­mis­sion­er’s de­ci­sion to the Firearms Ap­peal Board.