News
The Right to Adequate Housing
#TurksandCaicos, November 3, 2021 – A joint approach to changing the Crown Land Policy is coming and it could end the scramble for vacant lots for home and other developments; the Turks and Caicos and the UK will work together to make the process more fair to islanders.
Premier of the Turks and Caicos Islands, Hon. Washington Misick announced plans are advancing for land reform and housing development for citizens across the islands.
Speaking at a recent press conference, he said people are anxious to obtain Crown land, to be able to build houses, and “not having to stick their hands in a garbage bag and take out a number.”
“The terms of reference are being developed for the appointment of two consultants, one by the Turks and Caicos Islands Government, and the other by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, to fine tune the work that has already been done, but also to take a very holistic view, a very practical view as to how Crown land is to be handled in the future,” he told the conference.
While noting that “things are progressing nicely,” the Premier said the Government has achieved agreement that the current system is unworkable, and the administration is in the process to have a “comprehensive plan for” reform, he said.
The Premier also said a housing department has been set up in the Ministry of Physical Planning and Infrastructure, and it is making “tremendous strides,” with the Government focus on building communities.
“I want to be able to deliver keys to people, complete communities, than a piece of dirt, and that is going to require partnership with the private sector, and potential homeowners, financial institutions, to make sure that we all come together and provide housing,” he said.
He further added that the housing plan was clearly laid out in his party manifesto “that we are not about giving people a piece of dirt without roads, without water, without electricity and without cable,” instead, communities, as “everyone in this country who have a legal right to be here, deserves adequate housing.”
At this time there is a near 5-year moratorium on the issuance of Crown Land in the Turks and Caicos Islands.
Wilkie Arthur and Deandrea Hamilton
Turks and Caicos, September 13, 2024 – A barking dog is what drew attention to the baby left abandoned on a couple’s front porch in Kew Town, Providenciales on the morning of Tuesday September 3.
Discovered by a husband and wife, they reported to Eagle Legal News Media that they emerged from their residence to see what was going on, and were stunned to discover a most unexpected cause for the fuss; a baby boy, clad only in diapers, sitting outside on their porch.
“…it left me wondering and baffled as to how or what could have gotten into a mother and/or possibly a father to just abandon their baby on a total stranger’s porch…” said Wilkie Arthur, who picked up on the story and spoke to those involved in the sensitive case.
The Safeguarding and Public Protection Unit of the Royal TCI Police Force was immediately called in to investigate the peculiar
matter. It was described as emotional by an officer who opted to speak off the record, but candidly about the rare situation.
“Speaking to a female officer, whom we can’t name, due to the sensitivity and confidentiality of this case, she stated this was the most painful incident she’s ever heard of in all her years serving as an officer.”
It broke her down to tears informed the news blast which went out early on the morning of Wednesday September 4.
Communication with the TCI Police revealed that: “On Tuesday, 3rd September, the police responded to a report from a resident in the Dock Yard area of Providenciales that a child was found alone on their porch.
Officers responded to the address where a male child, approximately one-year-old, was found in the resident’s custody. Officers transported the child to the police station, and the Safeguarding and Public Protection Unit of the RT&CIPF and the Department of Social Development were informed.
Enquiries commenced, and investigations revealed that the child had been left in the care of an elderly relative who had fallen asleep. The child managed to unlock a door and wandered off.
Given the circumstances, the relative was given a stern warning by officers.”
Residents of Dock Yard in Kew Town were in a state of shock over the situation. Initially no one had claimed the child. As stated by police, the child has since been reunited with his family.
Wilkie Arthur
Eagle Legal News Media
Turks and Caicos, September 13, 2024 – In case one, allegations of a brother, of Dominican descent, raping his own sister and then hanging himself. In case two, allegations of another and known Dominican man after being deported or repatriated returns to the Turks and Caicos as a stow away and allegedly drowns.
Eagle Legal Court Correspondent was in the Coroner’s Court for the past two weeks when various different coronial matters were called.
The learned Coroner delivered her final decision on the two coronial matters mentioned above.
We will report on case number #1, “Allegations of brother raping sister, then killing himself.”
GABRIEL ESMIL DURAN, lived in Dock Yard, Kew Town, Providenciales. He was born in 1976 and allegedly hung himself in November 2021. His sister, whose initials are A V D, gave police a statement of her brother raping her about 12 hours before being found hanging with a rope around his neck.
The Hon Coroner relied on that statement to help aid her in her decision.
The sister said, her brother was drinking earlier that day, and after the sexual assault she ran out of the house and hid herself in the bushes until the morning. It was said that she told someone about the sexual assault. She said around 9pm she checked the door, it was locked, but in the morning the door was unlocked. The Coroner said there was no evidence of anyone entering the property, but one of her concerns was how the door got unlocked.
There was also information or evidence about his partner catching Covid-19 in the Dominican Republic, and that possibly weighed heavily on him.
Due to insufficient evidence surrounding the “police provisional suicide death” of Gabriel Esmil Duran, the learned Coroner did not reach the conclusion that this was a suicide death and her decision in the coronial matter was an “OPEN CONCLUSION”, which means if any further evidence was to ever come forward in this particular case, the coroner could reopen it.
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