A 62-year-old woman who has spent over 14 years living in a safe house in the Justice Protection Programme says she is being evicted by July 31.

Newsday decided not to name the woman based on her claim that she is still receiving threats from those linked to the case. By even speaking to the media, the woman is breaching the terms of her agreement but she says she is desperate for any help.

She wants those in authority to clarify whether she is still part of the Justice Protection Programme.

The person she gave evidence against is now dead but she claims friends of his co-accused are sending threats to end her life.

The woman entered the programme in 2010 after being robbed at gunpoint. She said she was relocated to a safe house with her two sons, and given a stipend of $4,000 a month.

However, since the suspect was killed some years later, she said there has been a total lack of communication from those associated with the programme.

She claimed she stopped getting a stipend in 2015 and only learnt of the suspect’s death via the news sometime later.

She told Newsday that some weeks after the death, an officer called and told her to go to Port of Spain to sign a document. When she got there, the document said she had to leave the safe house by the end of that day and find somewhere to rent on her own.

“I told him that can’t be. I said they were either supposed to provide somewhere for me to live, or let me know I needed to move out long before.

“I spoke to my brother, who is a police officer, and he told me to talk to an Ombudsman. I did, and then the police had to take statements from me. They told me something like that was never supposed to happen.”

She said she was then told the officer in question would be sent on extended leave.

She added that she has tried to find out several times why her stipend was stopped but to no avail.

“During the pandemic (in 2020), I went and begged one of my neighbours for things. Then they told some other neighbours and they came together and gave us some stuff…I get help from a church sometimes…

“But I can’t take it. I can’t live like this.”

The older of her two sons opted to get a job that earns him $900 a fortnight, which is what the family depends on.

“The State is still paying rent and cutting the lawn here at this house, but I am not getting anything.”

The woman is diabetic, blind in one eye and has heart problems.

“I am just here. It’s just tears; it’s just pain.”

Her younger son is also diabetic and has been unwell for some time, so he has not been able to work. He had two surgeries done in February.

Under the programme, she and her family are not supposed to leave the safe house without permission. But because of the lack of funding, she said they have had no choice.

“And I still get threats, because even though the person died, they were part of a gang. People would see me or my sons and say, ‘You think it done? It ain’t done. Man can’t dead for you.’

“They try to imply that I put a hit out on the man and that’s how he was kill