The Archdiocese of Port of Spain has launched an initiative to help reduce crime.

“We reason that if we reduce repeat offending we can reduce crime,” said Fr Matthew d’Hereaux at last Tuesday’s media conference on Trinidad and Tobago Reintegration Foundation (TTRF).

“We reason that if we can prevent ‘graduation’ into more serious crimes by breaking the cycle of repeat offending, we can also reduce crime. The Church has established this NGO to serve the national community by catering for offenders/ex-offenders of every creed and denomination,” he explained.

With Fr d’Hereaux were communications consultant Bernice Obasi, Chief Prison Welfare Officer Gordon Husbands and Deputy Commissioner of Prisons Herman Rougier. All four are directors of the Foundation, with Fr d’Hereaux holding the post of CEO.

The goal of the TTRF was to develop, initiate and sustain rehab programmes in the nation’s prisons with an aim to helping ex-prisoners re-settle into society, said Fr d’Hereaux. Its vision is: “To return to society productive, law-abiding citizens who are willing to serve family, community and country.”

But Husbands said while the TTRF hoped to retool inmates to retake their place in society, there would be challenges along the way. One of these will be the change in attitude required of all involved: inmates, prison officers, society.

Husbands said inmates would have to accept responsibility for the crimes they had committed, how these crimes had affected the community, and particularly the victim, the victim’s family and their own family.

Other challenges include overcoming society’s skepticism about reforming inmates, getting prison officers to accept the philosophy and ensuring continuity of the process in the inmates themselves.

Deputy Commissioner Rougier, brother of Commissioner of Prisons John Rougier, said this faith-based initiative was long in coming and differed from other initiatives in that it would begin within the penal system and continue even after the inmate has left prison.

Obasi said she hoped society would give the efforts of the TTRF a chance as “this is all part of the momentum going forward.”

Fr d’Hereaux, who also manages the Catholic Commission for Social Justice’s Walk Tall programme at the Maximum Security Prison in Arouca, ended with a plea for all civic-minded persons and corporate bodies to support the TTRF. Husbands echoed his call, saying there must be corporate and government-level involvement.

The TTRF will be officially launched on February 1 at Movie Towne Cineplex. His Excellency the President, Professor George Maxwell Richards, will be present as patron.

Expected to speak are Archbishop Edward Gilbert, Prisons Commissioner John Rougier, Fr d’Hereaux, Executive Director of Republic Bank, Nigel Baptiste, and ex-offender Virgil Lezama.

The keynote address will be delivered by Jamaican international motivational speaker Kevin Wallen, director of SET (Students Expressing Truth). Wallen has served as Director of Public Relations for Innocence International, the brainchild organisation of Reuben “Hurricane” Carter.

Carter spent 20 years in a US prison for a crime he didn’t commit. His story was made into a movie called Hurricane, with Denzil Washington in the lead role. Harvard University Professor, Charles Nissen, is expected to attend too.

Fr d’Hereaux also took the opportunity to announce that the Anthony Pantin Reintegration Centre, integral to the TTRF, was nearing completion and plans were being made for a June opening. The sod was turned for the centre last February.
- RS