Senior Reporter
Prisons Commissioner Carlos Corraspe has been sent on leave, days after the Prison Officers’ Association (POA) complained about alleged VIP treatment being given to businessman Dominic Hadeed, who is currently incarcerated at the Maximum Security Prison (MSP) in Arouca under a Preventive Detention Order (PDO).
Guardian Media understands that Corraspe was sent on leave for four months. Superintendent Elvin Scanterbury has been chosen to act during his absence.
In confirming the root of the issue yesterday, POA general secretary Lester Logie said he wrote to Corraspe about the matter on Friday, copying the letter to Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar and Minister of Homeland Security Roger Alexander.
In the letter, Logie said the association had raised concerns that Hadeed, the founder and executive chairman of Blue Waters Products Limited, was receiving treatment not afforded to other detainees, creating a safety risk for prison officers.
“Members were being threatened because of it. They said he was out late in the night. He’s outside his cell, all after eight, nine o’clock in the night. Most of the day, he is in the prison administration building,” Logie claimed.
“The officers seeing him watching football, that kind of thing, while the other detainees locked down in their cells. He watching World Cup and things like that in the admin building, that’s the administrative offices. We don’t have inmates in there.”
Logie said the administrative building is separate from the prison compound. He added that officers reported being threatened by other detainees who believe Hadeed was receiving preferential treatment.
According to Logie, Hadeed is being held in the remand section of the MSP and occupies a cell by himself. He said Hadeed is entitled to leave his cell for morning exercise and to receive visits but was getting other privileges.
“There are detainees there who were not getting those privileges and some made threats to officers based on the special treatment they saw him (Hadeed) getting. Those detainees don’t be out in the night and things like that,” Logie said.
Logie said remand prisoners are generally subject to the same daily regime as convicted inmates, including limited time outside their cells.
Asked whether he welcomed Corraspe being sent on leave, Logie said he hoped the move would lead to changes within the prison system.
“I hope it will send a message that corrective actions need to be taken because officers’ safety is our priority. We don’t want to lose officers because of that. So, some corrective action, I expect that the new commissioner, the sitting commissioner, will take.”
This is the second time Corraspe has been sent on leave since being appointed commissioner in July 2024.
In August 2025, he was placed on 240 days of vacation leave during the State of Emergency, which had been declared on July 18 and later extended by Parliament after intelligence suggested inmates at the MSP were plotting to kill senior officials in the law enforcement and justice sectors.
At the time, Alexander said Corraspe had accumulated more than 200 days of vacation leave, despite public officers generally being allowed to carry forward no more than 90 days.
Hadeed, 52, and his wife, Genevieve, 42, were arrested on June 24 as part of an investigation into an alleged conspiracy to murder the Prime Minister and other government officials. Following the execution of search warrants at their Westmoorings home and business premises in Trincity, Hadeed was remanded to the MSP on June 26.
The Hadeeds are challenging their continued detention under SoE orders in the court. That matter comes up for hearing in the Appeal Court today. Apart from their constitutionality argument, lawyers for the Hadeeds have complained of the unsanitary and inhumane conditions they have experienced since their incarcerations.
Guardian Media sought a comment from Corraspe, Alexander and the Prime Minister last evening, but calls and messages went unanswered up to press time.
