Pas­tor and ex-con­vict Glen Awong, the man who op­er­at­ed Trans­formed Life Min­istries in Arou­ca, where po­lice raid­ed and res­cued 69 peo­ple last year, has been charged with kid­nap­ping, false im­pris­on­ment and traf­fick­ing in per­sons.

Awong was charged at the Ari­ma Po­lice Sta­tion Thurs­day night, hav­ing ini­tial­ly sur­ren­dered to po­lice at the Arou­ca Po­lice Sta­tion to­geth­er with his wife, who was lat­er re­leased, on Mon­day last.

Awong's charges came al­most two and a half months af­ter the po­lice raid last Oc­to­ber that was prompt­ed by a two-month Guardian Me­dia in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to op­er­a­tions at the fa­cil­i­ty.

Se­nior po­lice sources told Guardian Me­dia that Awong was charged by Cor­po­ral Mc Kain of the Spe­cial Op­er­a­tions Re­sponse Team (SORT). He was charged with kid­nap­ping a man, as well as false im­pris­on­ment and traf­fick­ing of per­sons be­tween the pe­ri­od Jan­u­ary 30, 2019 to Ju­ly 2019. Po­lice al­so ex­pect to lay sev­er­al oth­er sim­i­lar charges against Awong in the com­ing days.

In­grid Jag­ger­nauth from Cen­tral Trinidad, who is the rel­a­tive of a lawyer, was al­so charged by Cor­po­ral Mc Kain for traf­fick­ing in per­sons. Jag­ger­nauth had been in po­lice cus­tody at the St Joseph Po­lice Sta­tion but was tak­en to the Ari­ma sta­tion on Thurs­day night where she was of­fi­cial­ly charged.

A civ­il lawyer and three oth­er peo­ple who had been de­tained for ques­tion­ing over the traf­fick­ing of per­sons in the on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion last Sat­ur­day were re­leased pend­ing fur­ther in­ves­ti­ga­tions ac­cord­ing to sources.

Se­nior po­lice sources say they have been work­ing tire­less­ly around the clock over the last two and a half months to piece this del­i­cate and ex­te­sive in­ves­ti­ga­tion to­geth­er, which saw them speak­ing with sev­er­al of the vic­tims res­cued.

Six­ty-nine peo­ple ran­ing in ages from 19 to 70 years were found locked away in cages at a church lcat­ed along the East­ern Main Road in Arou­ca in ear­ly Oc­to­ber. Fol­low­ing the raids, Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Gary Grif­fith de­scribed the case as one of a ma­jor hu­man traf­fick­ing ring that was cracked.