Some senior offi­cers in the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) have been sex­u­al­ly harass­ing their sub­or­di­nates, lead­ing the Commissioner of Police to issue a warn­ing in the Force Orders that crim­i­nal charges and dis­missal could result if they are found guilty of the offence.

“Numerous com­plaints have been received from some of our mem­bers of sex­u­al harass­ment by senior offi­cers. These reports indi­cate that sex­u­al harass­ment occurs in the Jamaica Constabulary Force in the form of unwant­ed phys­i­cal con­tact such as actu­al touch­ing, fondling, pinch­ing, cor­ner­ing or trap­ping by lean­ing over a work­er,” Dr Carl Williams, wrote in the Force Orders pub­lished last Thursday. The com­mis­sion­er said that harass­ment with­in the Force also takes the form of sex­u­al teas­ing or the telling of sex­u­al­ly explic­it jokes, sex­u­al­ly sug­ges­tive looks or ges­tures, repeat­ed requests for dates or meet­ings out­side work.

Williams’ warn­ing to cops fol­lows the tabling of the sex­u­al harass­ment bill in the House of Representatives in par­lia­ment last December by Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller. The bill seeks to out­law sex­u­al intim­i­da­tion, coer­cion and pes­ter­ing in the work­place, insti­tu­tions and in land­lord-ten­ant rela­tion­ships. For a first offence, Williams said the accused cop will be giv­en an oppor­tu­ni­ty to put for­ward his or her ver­sion of the alle­ga­tion. He said that if there is evi­dence to sub­stan­ti­ate the alle­ga­tion, then such an offend­er will be required to seek pro­fes­sion­al coun­selling. “If there is recur­rence, the mat­ter will be thor­ough­ly inves­ti­gat­ed and the file sent to the Police Services Commission and/​or the Director of Public Prosecution with a view of pre­fer­ring dis­ci­pli­nary and or crim­i­nal charges,” the com­mis­sion­er said. Williams said that he is cog­nisant that instances of sex­u­al harass­ment are like­ly to take place in pri­va­cy and with­out wit­ness­es. He said, how­ev­er, that it is impor­tant to pre­serve any cir­cum­stan­tial evi­dence which may cor­rob­o­rate the complaint.

Read more here: Cops Harassed — Commish Warns Sleazy Senior Officers About Sexual Advances

KINGSTON, Jamaica (AP) — Violent rival­ries among Jamaica’s lot­tery scam rings have helped to dri­ve the Caribbean island’s homi­cide rate to the high­est lev­el in five years, accord­ing to police.

The Jamaica Constabulary Force said the coun­try had at least 1,192 slay­ings in 2015, a rough­ly 20 per­cent increase from the pre­vi­ous year. There were 1,005 killings in 2014, the low­est annu­al total since 2003 in this coun­try that has long strug­gled with vio­lent crime. Jamaica had about 45 slay­ings per 100,000 peo­ple in 2015, keep­ing it ranked among the most vio­lent coun­tries in the world. In recent years, the UN list­ed the island as hav­ing the world’s sixth-worst homi­cide rate. The World Bank ranked Jamaica in the top five in 2013. By com­par­i­son, Chicago, which has rough­ly the same pop­u­la­tion as Jamaica at 2.7 mil­lion, had 468 killings in 2015.

Last year’s total is a long way from National Security Minister Peter Bunting’s goal of reduc­ing the annu­al homi­cide num­bers to 320 killings by 2017. He first stat­ed this goal short­ly after start­ing as nation­al secu­ri­ty min­is­ter in ear­ly 2012. Bunting, who had called the reduc­tion in 2014 a break­through in the fight against crime, said offi­cials “will not be deterred or daunt­ed by this set­back”. Authorities attribute the rise in killings to clash­es among lot­tery scam rings over mon­ey and “lead lists” con­tain­ing iden­ti­ty infor­ma­tion about tar­gets liv­ing abroad, most­ly in the United States. Fighting between gangs has long been blamed for the major­i­ty of Jamaica’s homicides.

Herbert Gayle, an anthro­pol­o­gist of social vio­lence at Jamaica’s University of the West Indies, Mona, said Wednesday that author­i­ties have not addressed the root cause of vio­lence in Jamaica, so it was only a mat­ter of time before killings ticked upward. While killings increased last year, oth­er crimes, such as rape, aggra­vat­ed assault, rob­beries and lar­ce­nies, decreased.  Jamaica homi­cides jump 20 per cent, high­est lev­el in 5 years

A New York police sergeant has been stripped of her gun and badge and served with depart­men­tal charges in rela­tion to the July 2014 choke­hold death of Eric Garner, the first offi­cial accu­sa­tion of wrong­do­ing in the case that helped spark a nation­al move­ment around the role of race in polic­ing. Sgt. Kizzy Adonis was one of the super­vis­ing offi­cers at the scene of Garner’s death on Staten Island dur­ing an arrest on sus­pi­cion of sell­ing loose, untaxed cig­a­rettes. She was not part of the team out inves­ti­gat­ing that day, but heard the radio call and was near­by and respond­ed to the scene. Officials said Friday that Adonis was charged with fail­ure to super­vise, an inter­nal dis­ci­pli­nary sanc­tion. Sgt. Ed Mullins, the head of her union, called the charge ridicu­lous and polit­i­cal. “She did­n’t have to go there — she chose to go there to help out, and look what hap­pens,” he said. “The only one that should be mod­i­fied should be Commissioner Bratton because this inci­dent stems from failed poli­cies that ulti­mate­ly led to the death of Eric Garner.” The encounter, caught on video by an onlook­er, spurred protests about police treat­ment of black men. Garner is seen yelling “I can’t breathe!” 11 times before los­ing consciousness.

The med­ical exam­in­er found the choke­hold con­tributed to his death. Coupled with police killings of unarmed black men else­where in recent months, Garner’s death became a flash­point in a nation­al debate about rela­tions between police and minor­i­ty com­mu­ni­ties. No one else in the case has yet to face depart­men­tal charges, and the inter­nal dis­ci­pli­nary review is on hold pend­ing a fed­er­al inquiry, at the request of the U.S. Attorney General for the Eastern District. Officer Daniel Pantaleo, who applied the choke­hold, remains on desk duty. A grand jury refused to indict him on crim­i­nal charges; he has said he was using a legal take­down maneu­ver. But Adonis had been pro­mot­ed to sergeant about two weeks before Garner’s death, and under depart­men­tal pol­i­cy, her pro­ba­tion­ary term would have been up had they not levied charges. She will now remain on pro­ba­tion, until her inter­nal case is com­plet­ed. “The NYPD, in con­sul­ta­tion with the United States Attorney’s office, served the depart­men­tal charges at this time in order to pre­serve the dis­ci­pli­nary statute of lim­i­ta­tions, and all fur­ther pro­ceed­ings con­cern­ing the Garner inquiry will con­tin­ue to be stayed until the con­clu­sion of the fed­er­al inves­ti­ga­tion,” the depart­ment said in a state­ment. Internal charges can lead from loss of vaca­tion days up to dis­missal from the depart­ment. Garner’s fam­i­ly set­tled with the city for $5.9 mil­lion. Sergeant at scene of Eric Garner death dis­ci­plined by NYPD

Rep. Raul Grijalva (D‑Ariz.) on Tuesday intro­duced a res­o­lu­tion call­ing on Congress to offi­cial­ly con­demn “the unlaw­ful, armed occu­pa­tion” of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon. “This is not a roman­tic instance of Western self-reliance or an excus­able moment of heat­ed rhetoric,” Grijalva said in a state­ment. “This is armed occu­pa­tion of pub­lic prop­er­ty by peo­ple who have threat­ened dead­ly force.” Approximately 20 armed occu­piers took over the gov­ern­ment build­ing on Saturday. They are protest­ing that Dwight and Steven Hammond were sen­tenced to five years in prison for com­mit­ting arson on fed­er­al­ly man­aged land to which they held graz­ing rights. The men’s fam­i­ly mem­bers have dis­tanced them­selves from the ille­gal occu­pa­tion, and said any sup­port for the fam­i­ly should be peaceful.

The leader of the occu­pa­tion is Ammon Bundy, the son of Nevada ranch­er Cliven Bundy, who became a con­ser­v­a­tive hero when he led an anti-gov­ern­ment stand­off with fed­er­al author­i­ties in 2014. Speaking to the press on behalf of the group, the younger Bundy said Sunday that the group intend­ed to resist gov­ern­ment tyran­ny and was will­ing to stay at the wildlife refuge’s head­quar­ters indef­i­nite­ly. Ryan Bundy, his broth­er, said they were will­ing “to kill and be killed.“Grijalva’s res­o­lu­tion high­lights dis­rup­tions the occu­pa­tion has caused in the local com­mu­ni­ty, such as school clo­sures and fed­er­al employ­ees being unable to report for work. “It is imper­a­tive that this unlaw­ful occu­pa­tion does not esca­late into vio­lence,” it reads.

Some Republican pres­i­den­tial can­di­dates, includ­ing Sen. Ted Cruz (R‑Texas) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R‑Fla.) have spo­ken against the ille­gal tac­tics employed in Oregon. Former Pennsylvania sen­a­tor and pres­i­den­tial can­di­date Rick Santorum com­pared them to those used in the Occupy Wall Street move­ment, which Democrats gen­er­al­ly sup­port­ed. House Natural Resources Committee Chair Rep. Rob Bishop (R‑Utah) declined Grijalva’s appeal to sign on to his res­o­lu­tion, accord­ing to a Grijalva spokesman. Bishop’s office did not respond to a request for com­ment. In 2014, Cliven Bundy refused to pay fed­er­al offi­cials who arrived at his home to col­lect an esti­mat­ed $1 mil­lion in graz­ing fees. He gar­nered media atten­tion and the sup­port of some mem­bers of Congress, includ­ing Sen. Dean Heller (R‑Nev.) and Sen. Rand Paul (R‑Ky.). He lost much of that sup­port, how­ev­er, when he sug­gest­ed that black peo­ple might be bet­ter off as slaves rather than “under gov­ern­ment sub­si­dies.” His graz­ing fees are still out­stand­ing. President Teddy Roosevelt declared the area the gun­men are cur­rent­ly hold­ing in Oregon to be a nation­al wildlife refuge in 1908.
Congressman’s Resolution Condemns Bundy-Led Occupation In Oregon

The coun­try’s esca­lat­ing mur­der rate and a lack of faith in the secu­ri­ty forces to keep cit­i­zens safe have been cit­ed as two of the fac­tors behind a 14 per cent jump in the num­ber of Jamaicans issued with a firearm licence this year. At the same time, anthro­pol­o­gist on social vio­lence Dr Herbert Gayle, who made the asser­tion, is warn­ing that more firearms in the hands of cit­i­zens could present a “major risk” for more vio­lence. Yesterday, the Firearms Licensing Authority (FLA) revealed that up to the end of last month, 3,980 gun licences were issued this year, 489 more than in the cor­re­spond­ing peri­od last year.

The lat­est Periodic Serious and Violent Crime Review com­piled by the Jamaica Constabulary Force also shows that up to last Saturday, 1,192 per­sons were report­ed killed this year, a 20 per cent increase over the cor­re­spond­ing peri­od last year, which has pushed the coun­try’s mur­der rate up to 44 per 100,000. While acknowl­edg­ing that an increase in the num­ber of firearms issued to cit­i­zens could sig­nal that more per­sons are acquir­ing prop­er­ty, Gayle sug­gest­ed that it could also be a sign that more per­sons now believe that the secu­ri­ty forces are not able to ade­quate­ly pro­tect them and are pre­pared to take respon­si­bil­i­ty for their own safety.

“People usu­al­ly pan­ic [and] buy weapons. Once there is a spike in mur­ders, you nor­mal­ly see an increase in demand for [firearms],” Gayle assert­ed. “Losing faith [in the secu­ri­ty forces] might be strong, but peo­ple don’t feel pro­tect­ed, they don’t feel safe, and when this hap­pens, peo­ple are going to buy weapons to pro­tect them­selves,” he continued.

REASONS FOR APPLYING

Chief Executive Officer of the FLA Dr Kenroy Wedderburn indi­cat­ed in an email toThe Gleaner yes­ter­day that the firearm licences issued this year were to peo­ple across the “dif­fer­ent stra­ta”, who list­ed the pro­tec­tion of life and prop­er­ty, train­ing, and “sports usage” as their main rea­sons for apply­ing. But cit­ing the wave of gun vio­lence across the United States as an exam­ple, Gayle cau­tioned that hav­ing more weapons in the hands of cit­i­zens could cre­ate more prob­lems. The University of the West Indies lec­tur­er did not sin­gle out Jamaica, but assert­ed that very few coun­tries across the globe put gun licence appli­cants through what he called extreme­ly strin­gent psy­cho­me­t­ric assess­ment. “It’s not like every­one who has a gun is going to be sta­ble,” he rea­soned. In the Jamaican con­text, Gayle said one of the dan­gers for licensed firearm hold­ers is that they tend to “adver­tise themselves”.

“If peo­ple have weapons and they are mature about it, it’s not a prob­lem. But when peo­ple have weapons — and the weapons hold­ers are get­ting younger — and adver­tise them, you set your­self up because the wrong set of peo­ple might come for it,” he rea­soned. “If you nev­er had a weapon, you would behave your­self. Man cuss you off at the stop light, you gone ’bout you busi­ness because you know you don’t have any­thing (weapon) on you,” he added. As a result, Gayle wants to see licensed firearm hold­ers trained in how to man­age their weapons.
Rising Crime Pulls Trigger — More Jamaicans Rushing To Arm Themselves

Two police­men have been killed and a civil­ian injured in a dri­ve-by shoot­ing in Yallahs, St Thomas.

The com­mand­ing offi­cer for the parish, Deputy Superintendent Charmaine Shand, said the inci­dent hap­pened about 8 p.m. However, she could not pro­vide any fur­ther details. It’s under­stood that the shoot­ing hap­pened at a shop in the St Thomas town. It’s also report­ed that one of the cops was attached to the West Kingston Police Division. He is the third cop from that divi­sion to be killed since July.

ST CATHERINE, Jamaica – The police have con­firmed that for­mer Spanish Town Mayor Dr Raymoth Notice was last night shot by gun­men in Bog Walk, St Catherine.

Notice is cur­rent­ly the coun­cil­lor for the Bog Walk divi­sion in St Catherine.

Lawmen at the Bog Walk Police sta­tion said they are unable to give an update on his condition.
Former Spanish Town may­or Notice shot

The appeal brought by four police groups against the Independent Commission of Investigations (INDECOM) is to be heard next year.

The four groups – The Jamaica Police Federation, the Police Officers’ Association, the Special Constabulary Force Association and the United District Constables’ Association – are appeal­ing a rul­ing of the Constitutional Court affirm­ing the pow­er of INDECOM to arrest mem­bers of the force. The appeal was set for hear­ing in February, but could not pro­ceed because one of the lawyers appear­ing in the case was unavail­able. It is now set for hear­ing on May 30, 2016.

In July 2013, the Constitutional Court ruled that under com­mon law as well as the INDECOM Act, the com­mis­sion had the pow­er to arrest mem­bers of the secu­ri­ty forces. It also ruled that the pow­ers of the INDECOM Commissioner and his inves­ti­ga­tors in no way dilut­ed the author­i­ty of the Director of Public Prosecutions to con­tin­ue, takeover or dis­con­tin­ue any pros­e­cu­tion. But the four police groups are argu­ing that the rul­ing has seri­ous oper­a­tional and con­sti­tu­tion­al impli­ca­tions and must be chal­lenged at the high­est lev­el. The INDECOM Commissioner and the Attorney General are the respon­dents. Cops’ Appeal Against INDECOM’s Power To Arrest Set For May

COMMISSIONER of the Independent Commission of Investigations (INDECOM) Terrence Williams is like­ly to be includ­ed among the per­sons who can make appli­ca­tions for indi­vid­u­als to be tak­en under the pro­tec­tion of the secu­ri­ty forces.

A joint select com­mit­tee of Parliament, which had been review­ing the per­for­mance of INDECOM dur­ing its first five years of oper­a­tions, has accept­ed a rec­om­men­da­tion from Commissioner Williams that the Justice Protection Act should be amend­ed to allow the min­is­ter, by order, to expand the cat­e­gories of enti­ties that can apply on behalf of per­sons for admis­sion into the wit­ness pro­tec­tion programme.The com­mit­tee said, in its report tabled recent­ly in Parliament, that if a pproved, the change will allow the min­is­ter to make an order to add the com­mis­sion­er and any oth­er appro­pri­ate per­son or enti­ty to the list.

U.S. Republican pres­i­den­tial can­di­date Ben Carson may con­sid­er an inde­pen­dent bid for the White House, angry over a report on Republican Party maneu­ver­ing involv­ing this sum­mer’s nation­al nom­i­nat­ing con­ven­tion, U.S. media report­ed on Friday.

Carson was angry over a Washington Post report that Republican lead­ers were prepar­ing for a bro­kered con­ven­tion to pick their 2016 White House candidate.

“If it is cor­rect, every vot­er who is stand­ing for change must know they are being betrayed. I won’t stand for it,” Carson said in state­ment, Politico and CNN report­ed. If the report was accu­rate, he said, “I assure you Donald Trump won’t be the only one leav­ing the par­ty.” (Reporting by Doina Chiacu)
Ben Carson Threatens To Leave The GOP

The broth­er of a man killed by police after a wild car chase on the Saw Mill River Parkway said the cops could have shown some restraint, par­tic­u­lar­ly because no evi­dence has been recov­ered to show the sus­pect had a weapon. Justin Julbe, 23, said Thursday that he can’t believe his broth­er, Miguel Espinal, would have tried to tus­sle with an offi­cer and grab his gun.

COP SAYS MAN TRIED TO GRAB HIS GUN AS FATAL SHOT WAS FIRED

“Even if he fought a cop, why don’t you just Taser him?” Julbe said. “Personally, I would nev­er, ever, reach for a gun. If my broth­er’s already caught, he’s caught. I’m not stu­pid enough to do that, and my broth­er’s smarter than me. My broth­er would­n’t do that. I know damn well he would­n’t do that.” Espinal, 36, was shot and killed in the woods near Tibbetts Brook Park in Yonkers Tuesday after a chase that took cops from the Bronx to Westchester. Cops said they had lost sight of the Nissan Espinal was dri­ving dur­ing the chase, then spot­ted the car dou­bling back the wrong way near Exit 4. Espinal struck a medi­an and two oth­er cars before flee­ing with his pas­sen­ger into a wood­ed area. Moments lat­er Espinal was shot dead, and the pas­sen­ger, Akeem Smith, was nabbed after a short pursuit.

Cops said Espinal fought with one of the cops before the shoot­ing. “You should­n’t have chased him in the woods,” Julbe said. “They should have called back up. With more cops, they would have been able to sub­due him,” Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office said it would inves­ti­gate the shoot­ing, after a recent exec­u­tive order by Gov. Cuomo man­dat­ing that the AG probe police shoot­ings involv­ing unarmed sus­pects.Brother of man shot dead by police after car chase from the Bronx to Westchester says cops used exces­sive force

Our coun­try is in grow­ing dan­ger, and not just from the real threat of ter­ror­ist attacks. We are in jeop­ardy now from the inter­nal fear that cap­i­tal­izes on America’s worst instincts. Caution can be a pos­i­tive thing in response to seri­ous dan­gers, but pan­ic and fear can be very dan­ger­ous impuls­es, espe­cial­ly when they are used to incite the hatred of oth­ers by false lead­ers who pro­claim their own “strength” — peo­ple like Donald Trump.

Hatred of “the oth­er” because of fear has cre­at­ed some of the most dan­ger­ous move­ments in human his­to­ry. Donald Trump is appeal­ing to racial and reli­gious fear and hate in order to advance his own suc­cess. But an even greater dan­ger than Trump is the grow­ing pop­u­lar response to him, the stand­ing ova­tions to his most vicious attacks on racial minori­ties, immi­grants, and now all the mem­bers of a world reli­gion. Because of his noto­ri­ety and the rat­ings it gar­ners, the media grants Trump cred­i­bil­i­ty and con­stant cov­er­age of his con­tin­ued false­hoods and ugly assaults against those whom he has named as ene­mies — who are most­ly peo­ple of color.

For many years Trump has sought to por­tray the first black pres­i­dent of the United States as a for­eign­er and not “one of us.” Trump’s demo­niza­tion of immi­grants, in sharp con­trast to the facts, has changed the con­ver­sa­tion in America. After lying about Muslim reac­tions to ⁹⁄₁₁, Trump is now call­ing America to “com­plete­ly shut down” all Muslims from enter­ing the coun­try. In oth­er words, he is call­ing for an unprece­dent­ed, uncon­sti­tu­tion­al, and un-American test tar­get­ing peo­ple based on their faith.

Donald Trump is strate­gi­cal­ly stok­ing the racial fears and hate of a sol­id seg­ment of white America that fun­da­men­tal­ly rejects a diverse American future. The real mean­ing of his famous “Make America Great Again” mot­to is “Make America White Again.” And with their fears trumped up, his fol­low­ing is itself a dan­ger­ous threat to America. Since ⁹⁄₁₁, more Americans in the United States have been killed by white extrem­ists than by mil­i­tant jihadists.

Stopping this hate­ful spread of Islamophobia and racism must become a bipar­ti­san and trans-par­ti­san issue — because it is now a moral ques­tion. Leaders from both polit­i­cal par­ties must denounce Donald Trump’s state­ments and dis­tance them­selves from his dan­ger­ous ide­ol­o­gy. Journalism must return to the val­ues of truth­ful­ness, free­dom, integri­ty, equal­i­ty under the law, and reli­gious lib­er­ty in its cov­er­age. His tox­ic mes­sage is becom­ing a dan­ger­ous threat to our most basic American val­ues, and it should be treat­ed accordingly.

From a reli­gious per­spec­tive, Trump’s “strength” is a false­hood. Arrogance, lies, greed, the will to pow­er, and the manip­u­la­tion of racial prej­u­dice and xeno­pho­bia are not strengths to us, but are con­trary to all of our faith tra­di­tions. As faith lead­ers, it is time to call upon our con­stituen­cies to reject these false idols of pow­er and division.

It’s time to name Trump’s dan­ger­ous rhetoric for what it is. It is not only racist, but also fas­cist, with all the dan­gers that ide­ol­o­gy implies. And it’s time for American polit­i­cal lead­ers, and also for American reli­gious lead­ers, to denounce Donald Trump’s appeal to our worst instincts of fear and hate. We must act before his move­ment grows to become even more dan­ger­ous. The truth is that we have seen this before. And it’s time to tell the truth.

Jim Wallis is pres­i­dent of Sojourners. His book, America’s Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and the Bridge to a New America, will be released in January.
Story orig­i­nat­ed here : America’s Flirtation With Fascism

FORMER polit­i­cal ombuds­man Bishop Herro Blair yes­ter­day agreed that the island’s polit­i­cal lead­er­ship must com­mit to ful­ly dis­con­nect gov­ern­ment and par­ty resources from “thugs” as a first step in remov­ing the influ­ence and pow­er of dons in the soci­ety. Blair’s agree­ment came as he gave evi­dence before the Tivoli Enquiry, dur­ing which he tes­ti­fied about his efforts in May 2010 to get then Tivoli Gardens strong­man Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke to sur­ren­der him­self to the authorities.
He spoke also about see­ing approx­i­mate­ly 50 armed men in the com­mu­ni­ty before the start of the oper­a­tion on May 24, 2010 and the after­math of the operation.

In response to attor­ney Linton Gordon (rep­re­sent­ing the Jamaica Defence Force), Blair — who also head­ed the Peace Management Initiative — said he agreed 100 per cent that politi­cians should sev­er ties with dons, as he spoke pas­sion­ate­ly about the issue. “[The don’s] resources is also part of the polit­i­cal con­nec­tion… for a don to get con­tracts to offer secu­ri­ty for a Government con­tract any­where in this soci­ety and that has to be includ­ed in the con­trac­tu­al arrange­ment, I think is a blight on the polit­i­cal process in civ­il soci­ety,” Blair said, his tone wreak­ing of dis­gust. He said the dons were “cre­at­ed” and that “some of us in soci­ety” are respon­si­ble “for what we face today”. Following his evi­dence, Blair agreed with com­mis­sion chair­man Sir David Simmons to sub­mit writ­ten rec­om­men­da­tions, based on his “vast expe­ri­ence”, to the com­mis­sion on the prac­ti­cal steps that can be tak­en “to turn around things in Jamaica”. The enquiry is prob­ing the deaths of 76 peo­ple, accord­ing to the pub­lic defend­er’s inter­im report, as a result of the oper­a­tion to appre­hend Coke. Yesterday, dur­ing his exam­i­na­tion-in-chief led by attor­ney Pearnel Charles Jr, Blair said he vis­it­ed with Coke in Tivoli Gardens on Wednesday, May 19, 2010, with the bless­ings of then Prime Minister Bruce Golding, and the fol­low­ing Saturday with a mes­sage from then Commissioner of Police Owen Ellington to sur­ren­der to local author­i­ties or the United States.

He said that, on the first occa­sion, he spent 15 to 20 min­utes plead­ing with Coke to sur­ren­der to avoid blood­shed. But Coke declined, he tes­ti­fied, say­ing that he was await­ing the out­come of the mat­ter filed by his attor­ney in the Supreme Court chal­leng­ing the 2009 extra­di­tion request from the United States. The cler­gy­man tes­ti­fied that on the sec­ond vis­it, Coke again declined to sur­ren­der and at one point expressed fears that he would meet the same fate as his father Lester Lloyd Coke, who had died in a fire in the 1990s while in cus­tody await­ing extra­di­tion to the US. Blair said, under cross-exam­i­na­tion by Deborah Martin — one of the attor­neys for the Jamaica Constabulary Force — that the for­mer don was more con­cerned about his own sit­u­a­tion than how his deci­sion not to sur­ren­der was affect­ing the res­i­dents around him. During his exam­i­na­tion-in-chief, Blair said that when he first went to meet with Coke, he saw about 50 men with guns in the com­mu­ni­ty and that his escort, an asso­ciate of Coke’s, sig­nalled for them to allow their pas­sage. He said he saw block­ages in sec­tions of the com­mu­ni­ty. He said that, dur­ing his meet­ing with Coke, he asked him to have the men dis­arm or leave the com­mu­ni­ty. On his Saturday vis­it, he tes­ti­fied, he nev­er saw the men. He said he thought to him­self that Coke had acced­ed to his request. He told com­mis­sion attor­ney Symone Mayhew that res­i­dents were mov­ing about their busi­ness among the gun­men, say­ing that armed men were nor­mal fea­tures in com­mu­ni­ties like Tivoli Gardens.

Questioned lat­er by Linton, Blair agreed that it could nev­er be good for any cit­i­zen to be able to deploy 50 armed men in his defence. He added also that in any com­mu­ni­ty across the island, there are 50 or more men armed at any one time. He also said that, based on what he saw in Tivoli Gardens, he was pri­mar­i­ly con­cerned about the safe­ty of mem­bers of the secu­ri­ty forces when he was try­ing to secure Coke’s sur­ren­der. He said the only oth­er time he had seen that many guns was in the army, where he served as a reservist. He said he saw armed men from the Spanish Town Road entrance of the com­mu­ni­ty lead­ing to Coke’s Presidential Click office. Meanwhile, Major Warrenton Dixon, who was in charge of mor­tar usage dur­ing the oper­a­tion, start­ed giv­ing evi­dence yes­ter­day. He said care was tak­en to ensure the safe­ty of res­i­dents. He said the tar­get of the 37 mor­tar rounds fired was an open field.
http://​www​.jamaicaob​serv​er​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​B​l​air – Politicians-must-sever-ties-with-dons_19241583

Amid grow­ing crit­i­cism, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said he has asked the city’s top police offi­cer to step down.

After announc­ing that he was appoint­ing a task force to look at police account­abil­i­ty, Rahm said that “pub­lic trust” in the city’s police force has been “shak­en” and “erod­ed” so he has asked Superintendent Garry McCarthy to resign.

Of course, this comes about a week after a court order forced the city to release a videoshow­ing the police shoot­ing death of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. The black teenag­er was gunned down on Oct. 20, 2014.

The video shows Officer Jason Van Dyke shoot McDonald 16 times short­ly after Van Dyke stepped out of his vehi­cle. Right before the video’s release on Nov. 24, pros­e­cu­tors announced they would charge Van Dyke with first-degree murder.

Since then, pro­test­ers have tak­en to the streets, and many peo­ple — includ­ing the edi­to­r­i­al board of the Chicago Sun-Times — have called on McCarthy to quit or for Emanuel to fire him. Others have asked for Emanuel’s res­ig­na­tion, accus­ing the city of attempt­ing to cov­er up the shoot­ing by try­ing to block the video’s release for about a year.

Emanuel defend­ed McCarthy’s tenure, say­ing that he had brought crime rates down using com­mu­ni­ty polic­ing tac­tics. Still, the may­or said, a police chief is only as “effec­tive as the trust that the com­mu­ni­ty” places in him.

“Now is the time for fresh eyes and new lead­er­ship,” Emanuel said.

He added that his admin­is­tra­tion had opposed the release of the video to ensure the integri­ty of the inves­ti­ga­tion into the incident.

Emanuel was asked if he had been try­ing to block the release so that it would­n’t hurt his bid for re-elec­tion ahead of the vote last spring.

“I said a long time ago that upon the com­ple­tion of the inves­ti­ga­tion, the video would be released,” Emanuel said. The video, he said, was released hours after the inves­ti­ga­tion was com­plet­ed and charges were filed.

The may­or said fed­er­al author­i­ties were look­ing into the McDonald’s shoot­ing and so would this new task force.
Chicago Mayor Emanuel Asks Police Chief To Resign

Despite the many crime-fight­ing ini­tia­tives the police have tried in their quest to rein in law­less­ness, the year 2015 will go down in his­to­ry as the most mur­der­ous in the annals of west­ern Jamaica, espe­cial­ly in regards to the parish­es of Hanover and Westmoreland.

Up to mid-October, Hanover, which was the nation’s most peace­ful parish up until a decade ago, had reg­is­tered 54 mur­ders — the high­est mur­der count in any one year in the parish’s history.

During October, the sit­u­a­tion reached cri­sis pro­por­tions when six mem­bers of one fam­i­ly were slaugh­tered by gun­men and their ten apart­ment board house burnt to the ground. Four oth­er fam­i­ly mem­bers were injured in the attack.

A month ear­li­er, between Sunday, September 13; and Saturday, September 19, Hanover reg­is­tered sev­en mur­ders in rapid suc­ces­sion. The inci­dents includ­ed a triple mur­der in St Simon and a dou­ble-mur­der in Georgia.

The mur­ders, the major­i­ty of which took place in the Lucea police dis­trict, has ele­vat­ed Hanover to the sec­ond most mur­der­ous parish in the island behind St James, which is clos­ing in on 200 mur­ders this year.

In Westmoreland, which has emerged as a major crime hot spot in recent years, the parish has wit­nessed sev­er­al cas­es of mul­ti­ple mur­ders this year. In July, 53 year old Rose Murray and her daugh­ter Latoya Daley were shot dead in their Little London home in the pres­ence of two children.

Earlier this year, the parish also had a quadru­ple mur­der in Whithorn District, where 14 year old Shawn Clayton, 20-year-old Romario Drummond, 22-year-old Theodore Tennant and 16-year-old Demar Doeman, were attacked and mur­dered while play­ing video games at a busi­ness estab­lished in the com­mu­ni­ty. The police sub­se­quent­ly linked the killings to the illic­it lot­tery scam.

In St James, which has been the haven for ram­pant crim­i­nal­i­ty since the emer­gence of the lot­tery scam in 2006, mul­ti­ple mur­ders has become com­mon place. The month of July stood out as in the 24 hour peri­od between July 16 and 17, sev­en per­sons were mur­dered in dif­fer­ent inci­dents. The car­nage, which start­ed in Norwood, end­ed on the streets of down­town Montego Bay.

The per­sons killed in Norwood were, 31-year-old Sean Hudson, 40 years old David Dilbert and his 31-year-old rel­a­tive, Patrick Williams. The oth­er per­sons killed else­where were: 63-year-old taxi-oper­a­tor Phillip Campbell and his 42-year-old nephew, Kevin Campbell, of Rose Heights; and craft ven­dor Elizabeth Robinson, who was killed in the heart of down­town Montego Bay.

Within recent weeks, on the advice of the National Security Minister, Peter Bunting, sol­diers have been deployed to the main crime hotspots across the region while the lead­er­ship in the var­i­ous police divi­sions have been strength­ened in a new resolve to bat­tle the lawlessness.
The West Savaged By Multiple Murders

Imagine for a moment the nation­al response if a Muslim man killed a police offi­cer, an Iraq war vet­er­an and a young moth­er in a mass shoot­ing in which four oth­er police offi­cers and five oth­er peo­ple were seri­ous­ly injured.

What if it was a refugee who did the killing? An undoc­u­ment­ed immi­grant? Someone from Syria?

Could you imag­ine if the Planned Parenthood shoot­er was a Black Lives Matter pro­test­er? What would the nation­al response be if that pro­test­er shot five police offi­cers, killed one, killed a dec­o­rat­ed war vet­er­an, killed a moth­er and shot 11 peo­ple in all?

Be real here. You know the answer.

If any­one oth­er than an angry white man like Robert Lewis Dear had killed a moth­er, a police offi­cer and a war vet­er­an in a mass shoot­ing, you know and I know that heav­en and earth would move to restrict and penal­ize and demo­nize any­one who even resem­bled or was remote­ly con­nect­ed to that person.

I shud­der at the thought of what might hap­pen to Syrians in America if the shoot­er had been a Syrian. If the shoot­er had ever in his life even post­ed the hash­tag #BlackLivesMatter every sin­gle mem­ber of the mod­ern-day civ­il rights move­ment would be asked how we encour­aged or pro­mot­ed or sanc­tioned such vio­lence. The death threats would come pour­ing in and we would all be at greater risk.

Somehow, though, when a white man ter­ror­izes soci­ety by bring­ing down vio­lent mur­der and may­hem on any­body in his pres­ence, be it a school, a movie the­ater, a gov­ern­ment build­ing or a Planned Parenthood clin­ic, white men get a pass that I am pret­ty dog­gone sure nobody else in America gets.

In spite of the real­i­ty that it has been wide­ly shared that white men are the “biggest ter­ror threat in America,” it’s a real strug­gle to think of any mean­ing­ful push­back against white men to curb such a threat. Even though not a sin­gle Syrian or a sin­gle refugee attacked Paris recent­ly, mass hys­te­ria reached such a fevered pitch in America that over 30 gov­er­nors and the United States House of Representatives came togeth­er in mat­ter of days to make it clear that they didn’t want Syrian refugees com­ing into America.

It appears that America is much more will­ing to plan, shift, restrict, debate, and leg­is­late fic­tion­al threats to our safe­ty than any of the home­grown vari­ety. Ultimately, I’m left to con­clude that America doesn’t real­ly care about its cit­i­zens being ter­ror­ized as long as it’s white men caus­ing the harm.

KING: How would the U.S. react if the Planned Parenthood shoot­er was not a white male?