Acting Police Commissioner Stephen Williams said opposition leader Dr Keith Rowley does not necessarily need to provide digital proof in relation to the emails he presented in the Trinidad and Tobago parliament last month, purporting to show that government officials conspired to cause harm to a journalist, bribe the DPP into accepting a position as a judge and seeking to get the assistance of Chief Justice Ivor Archie to help them accomplish their plan.
Information technology expert Mark Lindersay told the Trinidad Express that Rowley may need to furnish investigators with digital proof of his claims so the contents can be properly traced back to the alleged sources potentially incriminated in the matter. Lindersay also indicated that anyone can create what looks like email exchanges between several persons.
Williams, who is himself an attorney-at-law, agreed that anyone with the required technical knowledge can design what looks like an email exchange between parties; but explained that, in spite of this, while it would have been more useful for the opposition leader to provide the electronic proof of his claims, he does not necessarily have to do so.
The acting commissioner said once they find reasonable suspicion that a criminal offence was committed then they will consider one or two avenues to obtain the devices used in the alleged e-mail exchanges; that is either through a warrant or a court order that will lawfully allow the investigators to seize the devices that may have been used to communicate what is said to be intentions of a criminal nature between email addresses purporting to belong to Prime Minister Kamla Persad Bissessar, Attorney General Anand Ramlogan, Works and Infrastructure and Local Government Minister Suruj Rattan Rambachan and advisor to the prime minister Captain Gary Griffith.
All the parties named in the email exchanges admitted that the email addresses belonged to them, but denied any involvement in such an exchange.
The government showed discrepancies in the email content presented by Rowley, which included inconsistent dates and invalid email addresses.
Persad-Bissessar wrote to Williams and asked for an immediate investigation into the claims.
Williams said that Rowley, being the individual purporting to have the incriminating emails, is an integral part of what is now an ongoing investigation.
