Briefs…

POLICE TO PATROL IN NUMBERS.

Remarkably these sim­ply oper­a­tional details have to be announced by a min­is­ter. These sim­ple things are among the most mun­dane steps the police can take with­out a grand min­is­te­r­i­al announcement.
When did the police brass get this epiphany? I get crit­i­cized for chal­leng­ing the police to do bet­ter with what it has , this is one such moment in which the police must real­ly ask itself why is some­thing this sim­ple a part of any new strategy?

Patrolling in num­bers is cru­cial in light of the lawlessness,the propen­si­ty to resist arrest, and the lack of puni­tive sanc­tions for resist­ing arrest and assault­ing officers.
It also has the very real effect of reduc­ing if not total­ly elim­i­nat­ing the very real desire to fight with police officers.
As I have writ­ten over the years Jamaican peo­ple will means test their police offi­cers to ensure they are tough enough to be trust­ed to defend them.
Their meth­ods (usu­al­ly ill-advised con­fronta­tion with a young offi­cer ) was their crude yet not total­ly borne out of mal-intent was their way of decid­ing whetehr a cop was wor­thy of their respect.
Decisive actions by police in effec­tive­ly and prompt­ly exe­cut­ing arrest includ­ing any­one who inter­feres, is one of the best tools offi­cers have at their disposal.
Not just to deal with indi­vid­ual inci­dents but in elim­i­nat­ing future occurrences.
Patrolling in strength it is only one com­po­nent of what’s need­ed from the police. The police must show what they are taught in effec­tive­ly and deci­sive­ly exe­cut­ing arrest.
It is impor­tant to effec­tive­ly tar­get those who would intervene.
Most impor­tant of all is get­ting reinforcements(backup) to offi­cers in dis­tress in record time and ensur­ing that no one who attempt to inter­fere in an arrest is allowed to walk away with­out being arrested.

National Security Minister Robert Montague advised this week that cops will be patrolling in greater num­bers. Perhaps this gath­er­ing on West Street, down­town Kingston, is a show of that force.

More judges for parish courts

The Government is seek­ing to increase the num­ber of judges avail­able to serve in parish courts. “In the short term, we want to employ at least anoth­er 15 or 20 judges per­ma­nent­ly or on a part-time basis to deal with the back­log in the parish courts,” said Minister of Justice Delroy Chuck. He was mak­ing his con­tri­bu­tion to the ²⁰¹⁶⁄₁₇ Sectoral Debate in the House of Representatives on Wednesday. Minister Chuck not­ed that the parish courts are now over­bur­dened with civ­il and crim­i­nal cas­es and “it is impor­tant that we attend to them urgently”.
“This is where the aver­age man gets his jus­tice and we have to make sure more judges, pros­e­cu­tors and clerks of court are avail­able so that these mat­ters can be dealt with,” he point­ed out.

Meanwhile, the Justice Minister is encour­ag­ing Jamaicans to utilise alter­na­tive means such as arbi­tra­tion and restora­tive jus­tice to deal with dis­putes. He not­ed that the Restorative Justice Bill will be brought before Parliament short­ly. “If we can get the offend­er to admit that he has com­mit­ted the offence and the vic­tim to for­give, then we can say use restora­tive jus­tice to exer­cise mer­cy in the dis­pos­al of the mat­ter,” the Justice Minister said. As it relates to arbi­tra­tion, he informed that a bill is to be sub­mit­ted to Cabinet before tabling in Parliament. The Justice Minister not­ed that many coun­tries, such as Singapore, have been mak­ing use of arbi­tra­tion to set­tle com­mer­cial dis­putes. “When big mon­ey is in con­flict, many of the par­ties do not want to go to court; they want arbi­tra­tors to assist them in com­ing to a deci­sion. Singapore is now becom­ing the top place for arbi­tra­tion,” Chuck said. He said it is hoped that not only will Jamaica have a mod­ern leg­is­la­tion but that the coun­try will become an arbi­tra­tion cen­tre “for those big com­pa­nies that have dis­putes and want it to be dealt with not in the courts, but by arbitrators”.
http://​www​.jamaicaob​serv​er​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​P​o​l​ice – force-_64263
It appears that the Government is begin­ning to rec­og­nize that growth can­not hap­pen as it should in anarchy.We applaud these moves even as we ask the police to be a lot more proac­tive in how it approach­es it’s task.