Government’s Lack Of Decisive Action Responsible For Cop Killings

Almost dai­ly I write about crime in Jamaica . I also get on the air­waves and talk about it at times.
I do so not because I am fix­at­ed with the neg­a­tive things hap­pen­ing in our country.
I do so because I under­stand that pre­tend­ing that we are going to build wealth and pros­per­i­ty with­in spaces dom­i­nat­ed by mur­der may­hem and chaos is sim­ply delu­sion­al at best, or worse a bla­tant lie being per­pet­u­at­ed on the nation.
As I said to a for­mer col­league ear­li­er today in pri­vate, when I con­sid­er the safe­ty and secu­ri­ty of our coun­try I do not think of the People’s National Party as part of the solu­tion for rein­ing in the lawlessness.
There sim­ply has been no prece­dent in the his­to­ry of the PNP to act on crime and social disorder.
The PNP has cap­i­tal­ized on law­less­ness in order to craven­ly dom­i­nate state power.

The Party does so using the tac­tic of populism.
Their pop­ulist “do what­ev­er you want wink and nod: has turned Jamaica into what it is today, one of the world’s most vio­lent, crime rid­den nations tee­ter­ing pre­cip­i­tous­ly on the brink of becom­ing a failed state.

So we are left with the Jamaica Labor Party the oth­er major polit­i­cal party.
The labor par­ty was the par­ty of fis­cal dis­ci­pline, the par­ty of law and order, it was the par­ty which cared about workers .
It was Bustamante who spent almost two years in prison for dar­ing to chal­lenge the exist­ing mores of the rul­ing Colonial mas­ters on behalf of ordi­nary workers.
It was Bustamante who bared his chest to sol­diers and said “shoot me and let my peo­ple go”,
It was Bustamante who kept our coun­try out of a calami­tous West Indies Federation , which was to col­lapse soon after Jamaica withdrew.
It was under Bustamante that our coun­try was placed on a sol­id foot­ing of auton­o­my and self determination.
Not the Ivy league edu­cat­ed Norman Manley.

That par­ty is no longer around.
This Labor Party is not the par­ty of Herbert Eldemire , Donald Sangster and it damn sure isn’t the par­ty of the Rt. Hon Hugh Lawson Shearer.
Is it still an improve­ment over the pathet­ic pow­er hun­gry PNP which is only after steal­ing from state funds ?
Absolutely yes.
Nevertheless it was the Labor Party which refused to extra­dite Christopher Coke.
It was the new JLP which allowed Tivoli Gardens to mat­u­rate into the moth­er of all Garrisons.
It was the JLP which gave the nation INDECOM.
It is the JLP which refus­es to repeal the atro­cious cop killing law and for that the par­ty must be held accountable.
And it is the JLP which now has the pow­er to move deci­sive­ly against the nation’s ter­ror­ists, and it has not done so.

Until The Prime Minister Fires Terrence Williams He Is Responsible For Every Innocent Life Lost To Marauding Criminals ..

♦At the intro­duc­tion of the INDECOM act I said it would embold­en crim­i­nals , almost 7 years lat­er there is irrefutable evi­dence that crim­i­nals and ordi­nary folks alike are embold­ened to not only break the laws but they open­ly assault and kill Police officers.
♦ At the roll out of the law I said the atti­tude of the com­mis­sion­er of INDECOM Terrence Williams, would send a clear and unequiv­o­cal mes­sage that they have an ally and pro­tec­tor in INDECOM.
They do.
♦I said crime would increase and increase exponentially.
It has.
♦I pre­dict­ed a spike in homicide.
There has been.
♦I said cops would be killed .
The evi­dence is clear they are being killed.

And so yes­ter­day anoth­er cop had his life snuffed out in broad day­light, in his uni­form because two things occurred .
He was too scared of INDECOM to effect the arrest the cor­rect way .
And his killer knew it was okay to resist arrest and kill a cop.
The sit­ting Administration stead­fast­ly refus­es to say this was ill-con­ceived, we will revis­it the law. .
On that basis every dead cop, every law abid­ing cit­i­zen who dies is the respon­si­bil­i­ty of the government .
The blood is on their hands.

As Police offi­cers and cit­i­zens lives con­tin­ue to be snuffed out in alarm­ing num­bers, the Government is death­ly silent.
In oth­er coun­tries when a police office is killed there is mas­sive push-back from their soci­eties and cer­tain­ly Government.
Under both Political par­ties stew­ard­ship, the ruth­less killing of Police offi­cers illic­it crickets.….…
Deafening silence.….…..
Not Portia, Not Peter Phillips and damn sure not Andrew Holness.
These mis­guid­ed lit­tle morons sit by and make no state­ment, as if the death of police offi­cers is beneath them, the per­rog­a­tive of under­lings to address.
Who the fuck do they think they are ?
The Police have not released an offi­cial state­ment on the mat­ter thus far.

Clearly this force is not learn­ing any­thing regard­ing mod­ern polic­ing pro­to­cols and it’s mem­bers are pay­ing a high price for the incom­pe­tence of it’s leadership.
The offi­cer was mur­dered and a senior offi­cer in kha­ki dress was seen on the scene no one lift­ed a fin­ger to offer first aid.
The scene was not closed off imme­di­ate­ly, anoth­er breach of protocol/​Passers by pho­tographed and video taped the dead officer.
The videos and images are plas­tered across social media .
Motorists drove on the side­walks to get to where they were going,in a sit­u­a­tion where the entire area ought to have been closed to all traffic.
Clearly there was no obser­va­tion of any estab­lished best prac­tices, an insult to the fam­i­ly of the dead officer.
This Police force con­tin­ue to be the Barney Fyffe of law enforcement .

On the issue of train­ing , I have been talk­ing about this for years. Simply observe estab­lished norms across oth­er police depart­ments, then train and oper­ate acordingly .
Only in Jamaica is it frowned upon when offi­cers order crim­i­nals to the ground at gun­point in order to effect an arrest.
Had this offi­cer observed these basic stan­dards, he would have been alive today.
I served in the JCF between January 1982 until October 1991 .
You best believe dur­ing my servuce when I order you to get down on your knees you are going to do as I say.

Every offi­cer has a right to go home to his/​her fam­i­ly, the same way Andrew Holness , Peter Phillips, and Terrence Williams does.
They should nev­er be appre­hen­sive that some bureau­crat will sit in judge­ment of them , when they are the ones risk­ing their lives.

This case brings tears to my eyes , I too was sta­tioned at Constant Spring.
Word is that the oth­er offi­cer with the slain offi­cer ran away.
On the night I was shot the oth­er two key­stone cops ran away, one was a detec­tive cor­po­ral, the oth­er a District Constable.
I under­stood the actions of the dis­trict con­sta­ble then ‚but the corporal.…?
He would lat­er be pro­mot­ed to the Rank of Senior Superintendent after I left the department.
A reflec­tion of how the force has regressed over the years because of polit­i­cal manip­u­la­tion and strangulation.
Despite being shot that night I was able to sin­gle hand­ed­ly remove anoth­er brand new weapon and ammu­ni­tion from the streets.

I offer my con­do­lences to the fam­i­ly of con­sta­ble Leighton Hanson, your son gave his life to an ungrate­ful nation.
Notwithstanding you should be eter­nal­ly proud.
Your son’s sac­ri­fice was not in vain .
He died so that peo­ple less than him­self and unde­serv­ing of his life’s work and sac­ri­fice may live.
Unfortunately for you ‑you are now left to grieve his loss.
We offer our love and prayers.

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