Res­i­dents of sev­er­al com­mu­ni­ties con­sid­ered “high-crime” ar­eas have ex­pressed mixed views on whether the lat­est State of Emer­gency (SoE) will pro­duce any mean­ing­ful re­sults.

The SoE, which was de­clared on Tues­day via a state­ment from Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, is the third such re­sponse to vi­o­lent crime in the past two years.

An SoE was de­clared in De­cem­ber 2024 by the for­mer Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM)-led gov­ern­ment in re­sponse to an uptick in gang vi­o­lence in and around east Port-of-Spain and Laven­tille.