Police Not Effective

In the front page article in the daily Gleaner today entitled "Gun Licence requests triple" I see them quoting some crime statistics that are as bogus as they come.

This country owes a debt of gratitude to former commissioner Ellington, under whose watch murder was reduced by almost a quarter although we are no where close to what he civilised world lives with.

However, I do not think the police has been acculturised to pay any attention to other forms of crime (although one gets the impression  that only minimal attention is paid to murder anyway) and instead of devising measures to deal with these, they produce statistics like robberies being at 1311, which have no bearing on reality. I say this as I know for a fact, that police do not investigate, visit the scene or record some robberies (praedial larceny too!) reported to them  although I do not know to what extent this is so or if it is a mater of policy.

 

Take Kingston and St. Andrew, where there is a new and growing form of gun robbery being carried out in residential neighbourhoods with such precision, that a policeman told a recent victim that he thinks the gang that perpetuates it, have people with either military or police training. 

This is daylight robbery being carried out by well dressed young men  (who seem to operate in pairs but have a vehicle and driver close by) who are appearing to be  going about their lawful business in residential areas. As they do not appear threatening, no one pays much attention to them until they pounce on unwary residents and force them at gunpoint into their homes which they then pillage at their leisure, loading the loot into the waiting vehicle.

A  friend who was  the victim to such a robbery recently, told me that his quick response security personnel told him that they had received  as much as 5 such reports of this type of operation in one day recently. Another private security person told me that in one day they had received 21 calls from clients on that morning alone, although these calls were about different different types of crimes, not just the ambushes. 

So if this type of robbery is so pervasive why has the police not been putting out composite images of the young men who are carrying out these ambushes in broad daylight all over town and who do not use disguise?

I tell you why, it is because the police have no interest in solving robberies committed against ordinary citizens!) preferring instead to to put out bogus statistics thus causing people to be even less vigilant as they go about their lawful business while the hold up men have  a field day and their victims suffer grave psychological trauma in silence for months on end.

Then there are the criminals who seem to  work for some cash for gold operators. 

I wonder what percentage of persons who used to enjoy open air exercising on the streets of the city can say they have not been robbed of phones and jewellery at gunpoint or know someone who has been ?

-I have no doubt  that the tripling of requests for gun licences that the report in the Gleaner spoke to, has something to do with the grave sense of insecurity that pervades despite the billions we spend on secirtuy.