The Min­istry of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty has is­sued 40 Pre­ven­tive De­ten­tion Or­ders (PDOs) un­der the Emer­gency Pow­ers Reg­u­la­tions, 2026, re­sult­ing in the de­ten­tion of in­di­vid­u­als al­leged to be linked to or­gan­ised crim­i­nal net­works, gang lead­er­ship struc­tures and firearm-re­lat­ed vi­o­lence across Trinidad and To­ba­go.

The or­ders were is­sued be­tween March 18 and May 25, au­tho­ris­ing de­ten­tion at fa­cil­i­ties in­clud­ing the East­ern Cor­rec­tion­al Re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion Cen­tre at San­ta Rosa, Ari­ma, the Re­mand Prison at Gold­en Grove, Arou­ca, and the Women’s Prison, where ap­plic­a­ble.

In each case, Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Roger Alexan­der de­ter­mined that de­ten­tion was nec­es­sary to pre­vent the in­di­vid­u­als from act­ing in a man­ner prej­u­di­cial to pub­lic safe­ty, in ac­cor­dance with reg­u­la­tion 14 of the Emer­gency Pow­ers Reg­u­la­tions, 2026, and pro­vi­sions of the An­ti-Gang Act, 2021.