Court frees six people on human trafficking charges

PORT-OF-SPAIN (CMC):

A magistrate court has upheld a no-case submission filed on behalf of six people, including a pastor, who had been charged with human trafficking.

Pastor Glen Awong, the head of Transformed Life Ministry, was jointly charged with former school principal Cheryl Kallicharan Beharry, attorney Lena Jaggernath, her mother, Indra Jaggernath, Anthony Marchan and Robert Andrews in December 2019.

They had been charged with trafficking in persons, kidnapping and false imprisonment after police raided the facility and rescued 69 people.

The preliminary enquiry into the matter began about a year ago and on Tuesday, Magistrate Brambhanan Dubay, sitting in the Arima Magistrates’ Court, east of here, upheld the no-case submission made by the defence headed by attorney Wayne Sturge.

Awong, speaking to reporters following the ruling, said he believed the plot to charge him arose over a payment dispute with the State for taking care of the homeless, mental clients and drug addicts.

“We pass through a bitter experience because they did not want to pay money owed to us,” he said, adding that the dispute over unpaid fees was still before the court.

“It is a bitter experience if somebody should charge you for human trafficking, money laundering and imprison you,” without any evidence, he said, adding that the six intend to file a lawsuit against the state for malicious prosecution.

The defence had argued that the case brought by the state against their clients was insufficient as there wasn’t evidence which could be relied upon to form a prima facie case against the group.

On October 8, 2019, the Special Operations Response Team (SORT), now disbanded, and led by former police commissioner Gary Griffith, went to Transformed Life Ministry’s rehabilitation centre in Arouca, along the east5-west corridor, where the police said they had rescued 69 people, some of whom, they claimed, were naked and locked in cages.

Police said they also found and seized handcuffs, batons and Tasers.

The case against the six was based on the testimony of two of Beharry’s children, Selwyn and Christiana, and several police officers.