There is much to be said about the disparity between African-American and White Evangelicals and their response to Donald Trump. Persons paying attention can prattle off a litany of these disparities between the two groups. We understand that Franklin Graham’s views differ from that of his father the late Reverend Billy Graham, at least in public.
We also understand that Pat Robertson’s hypocrisy is astounding as it relates to Barack and Michelle Obama and Donald Trump. In instance, after instance, there is more than ample evidence that even in the supposed body of Christ Race is a significant factor. The simple fact is that all of the disparities come down to one word “Race”.
At some point in time, the African-American community must decide whether it is being served with the voices of these heretics elevated to speak on its behalf?
At the risk of piling on, I have to ask whether or not the mainstream media is doing this nation a tremendous disservice by highlighting certain Members of the Black Clergy in the age of Trump.
Darrel Scott
The challenge for members of the African-American community is how to disassociate itself from apostates like Mark Burns and Darrel Scott. This at a time when the media continue to give these heretics a platform to speak on behalf of a system and an occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue whose values are antithetical to their values.
In December 2012, a gunman walked into Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, and killed 20 children, six adults, and himself. Since then, there have been at least 1,607 mass shootings, with at least 1,846 people killed and 6,459 wounded.
The most recent mass shooting being at the Stoneman Douglas high school in Parkland, Florida in which 17 school age human beings had their lives unceremoniously snuffed out. Despite the constant shootings and the loss of innocent lives, the United States Congress has been frozen into immobility out of fear of the powerful gun lobby the National Rifle Association(NRA).
The NRA is not the only gun lobby in the United States but it is by far the most vociferous of the twenty-two (22) or so other lobby groups including the powerful Gun Owners of America (GOA)…
The issue of guns in America continues to be a serious issue as incidents of mass shootings, including school shootings, continue unabated. The American war of independence was won against Great Britain by men with guns, not a standing army but average citizens who decided to defend the land they themselves had appropriated from the native Americans.
There is far more than the history of America which goes into Americans love for guns. As important as the history is, the future is probably exponentially more so to gun owners. That, however, is for another conversation at another time. According to the New York Times, over 30% of Americans own guns. From published reports, of the 30% who do own guns, those households own five or more weapons.
This presents a conundrum for the families who are victims of gun violence. It is equally distressing that even as children are being slaughtered in their classrooms, the Congress of the United States is either unable or too afraid to act. There is much which can be done on guns in America, no one has an absolute right to own a submachine or machine gun, the Supreme Court already asserted that.
Journalist Robert Creamer wrote in (2011) “Beyond the question of what the Constitution means by the “right to bear arms,” we must also remember that no right is absolute. Each person’s rights are constrained by the extent to which they impinge on another person’s rights.” That truth is exemplified in the 1st amendment to the constitution which guarantees the right to free speech, yet one does not have the right to shout “Bomb” on an airplane or “Fire “in a crowded theater.
Yet in case after case, the weapon of choice in school shootings and other mass casualty incidents seems to be the dreaded AR15. Surely these weapons and others in their class can be removed from the hands of civilians but the average white male is not about to give up these fearsome weapons and truthfully there is no will anywhere within the body politic to remove them from their hands.That includes even in Democratic circles.
The power of the gun lobby cannot be ignored in the era of citizens united and big Kock and Adelson money in politics. But the challenge for America is how does she extricate herself from the tenacious tentacles of big money power on its everyday politics.
Big money and constitutional guarantees do present a problem for those who would like to see an end to these quite preventable mass killings in the United States. Smaller nations should take heed and learn from whats happening in America on this front and limit the power of their lobby groups in the shaping of policy.
In Jamaica, a small country of 2.8 million the power of the human rights lobby can easily be construed to be a criminal rights lobby. We have witnessed how their aggressive advocacy have hindered effective legislation, resulted in the creation of INDECOM, arguably a crime enhancement Agency and has hampered the police’s ability to do it’s jobs effectively.
Now is the time for the people of Jamaica to wake up and not allow foreign-funded lobby groups like JFJ, INDECOM or others to dictate our politics or policies while the streets run red with the blood of our children, parents, and family members. Now is the time to lay down some markers in the sand. There is no constitutional right to have foreign-funded lobby telling us how to enforce our laws.
Assessment 50 years after Kerner Commission points to child poverty and school segregation, along with emboldened white supremacists
Civil rights gains of the past half-century have stalled or in some areas gone into reverse, according to a report marking the 50th anniversary of the landmark Kerner Commission.
Child poverty has increased, schools have become resegregated and white supremacists are becoming emboldened and more violent, the study says.
“Don’t let anybody tell you that the problem is Donald Trump,” the Rev William Barber, a prominent North Carolina pastor, told a conference launching the 469-page report in Washington on Tuesday. “Long before Trump mastered a modern-day version of the con of the southern strategy, he had an audience that had been cultivated for 50 years.”
President Lyndon Johnson formed the original 11-member Kerner Commission as Detroit was engulfed in a race riot in 1967. The commission’s report concluded: “Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white – separate and unequal.”
Johnson’s major policy initiatives, the “great society” and “war on poverty”, had a positive impact, according to the new report, Healing Our Divided Society: Investing in America Fifty Years After the Kerner Report. The African American achievement gap in reading decreased by half during the early 1970s and early 1980s.
The report adds, however, that with the elimination of major federal programmes under Ronald Reagan during the 1980s, the achievement gap in reading grew once again and is now 30% bigger than it was 30 years ago.
Fred Harris, the last surviving member of the Kerner Commission, told Tuesday’s conference at George Washington University: “We made progress on virtually every aspect of race and poverty for nearly a decade after the Kerner report and then that progress slowed, then stopped and in many ways was reversed, so that today racial and ethnic discrimination is again worsening. We are resegregating our cities and our schools, condemning millions of kids to inferior education and taking away their real possibility of getting out of poverty.”
Harris, a former Democratic senator from Oklahoma and co-editor of the new report, added: “There are millions more poor people today than there were then. There’s greater child poverty; poverty’s harder to get out of. More poor people are in deep poverty than was true 50 years ago and income inequality is worse now and worsening.”
The report says the percentage of American children living in poverty increased from 15.6% in 1968 to 21% in 2017. The percentage of people living in deep or extreme poverty – defined as less than half the poverty threshold – has also gone up since 1975.
After a dramatic improvement in racial integration in education, especially in the south, court orders and housing patterns have led to a resegregation of public schools. In 1988, about 44% of black students went to majority white schools nationally; only 20% of black students do so today.
Three decades after the Fair Housing Act of 1968, black homeownership rose by almost 6%, but those gains were wiped out from 2000 to 2015, the report continues. It blames the decline on the disproportionate effect that the subprime mortgage lending crisis had on African American families.
Mass incarceration has increased the prison population from about 200,000 at the time of the Kerner Commission to about 1.4 million today, it also notes. African American men are nearly six times as likely to be incarcerated as white men.
Catherine Lhamon, chair of the United States Commission on Civil Rights, told the audience: “We have seen other times since the Kerner Commission when presidential administrations and Congress tested our ideals. Speaking for myself, I think of the Reagan administration as the nadir for civil rights before now but what worries me is this Trump administration is taking a page from the Reagan playbook and consolidating it. That scares me, frankly, and that is what I think needs to drive all of us for a meaningful call to action.
“This administration works to destabilize the federal judiciary, appointing judges who are affirmatively opposed to federal civil rights enforcement and to federal civil rights themselves. This administration issues speech after speech and tweet after tweet challenging equity principles and announcing that the administration will not enforce them. This administration generates dangerous policy and regulatory limitations on our rights.”
In his address, broadcast via video link, Barber highlighted the importance of voter suppression in states that can make all the difference in elections. “We have less voting rights today than we had on August 6, 1965, when the Voting Rights Act was passed,” said Barber, president of Repairers of the Breach, a religious and social justice not-for-profit group.
Two Los Angeles police officers pleaded no contestMonday to sexually assaulting multiple women, often preying on victims while one partner served as the lookout as the other carried out an attack in their unmarked police car.
In a downtown L.A. courtroom, Officers Luis Valenzuela and James C. Nichols entered their no-contest pleas to two counts each of forcible rape and two counts each of forcible oral copulation. The officers appeared in court in orange, jail-issued jumpsuits and were shackled at the waist.
“This hurts,” Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Ronald S. Coen said as he alluded to his own career in law enforcement and handed each man a 25-year term in state prison. The judge also ordered the officers to register as sex offenders.
If tried and convicted, the men had faced a maximum penalty of life in prison.
The Los Angeles County district attorney’s office had filed more than a dozen felony counts against the men in 2016, alleging they targeted four women from 2008 to 2011 by forcing them to have sex. Valenzuela was also accused of assaulting one woman with a gun. Most of those charges were dismissed as part of Monday’s plea deal.
The victims were women ages 19 to 34 who were informants for drug investigators or had been recently arrested on suspicion of drug-related crimes. Some of the women said they feared arrest if they did not obey Nichols’ and Valenzuela’s orders. The Times does not generally identify victims of sexual violence.
“How dare they. They wore a badge to protect people and instead they terrorized them,” Det. Carla Zuniga, one of the lead investigators in the case, said outside the courtroom. “They tarnished the public trust. People trust the police. Every time something like this happens, we have to walk into the community and say, ‘No, that’s not us.’ ”
Nichols, 46, and Valenzuela, 45, were put on unpaid leave from the Los Angeles Police Department in 2013 and had been relieved of duty. Monday’s plea deal clears the way for their formal termination. They have been jailed since early 2016, when LAPD detectives arrested them on felony charges.
Stewart Powell, Nichols’ defense attorney, said his client was “looking forward to his day in court” but accepted the plea so the case could close.
“It gives him a chance to get out and have a life after this case,” Powell said.
Valenzuela’s defense attorney, Bill Seki, said the plea deal allowed his client to one day reunite with his kids outside prison. Valenzuela, he said, was “pretty somber” before entering his plea.
“As the cases go, these times are tough for police officers,” Seki added.
The Times first reported on the misconduct allegations in 2013, when detectives sought a search warrant to seize computers and phones, part of an exhaustive investigation that involved scouring the officers’ work with drug informants in the Hollywood area.
Prosecutors sought to identify every possible woman who encountered the two.
“We do believe there may have been additional victims who chose not to coöperate with the investigation,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Ann Marie Wise.
The first woman to accuse Valenzuela and Nichols came forward three years earlier. She said that the officers picked her up in December 2008 for her work as an informant, where she’d score drugs and in exchange receive $40.
While in the back seat of the officers’ Volkswagen Jetta, she testified at a 2017 court hearing, Nichols exposed himself and asked that she touch him. Then, he pushed her head into his lap, she said.
Another woman said that after she was arrested in 2009 on suspicion of dealing heroin, the officers transported her from Hollywood to the LAPD jail in Van Nuys. She testified that Nichols and Valenzuela took a detour and stopped in an alley.
Valenzuela informed her that there was a way she could stay out of jail, and he had sex with her in the back seat of the Jetta, she testified. Nichols waited outside the car.
“I was in a dark alleyway with a guy with a gun,” she testified. “I didn’t really feel like I had a choice.”
She was subsequently released and did not have to post bail.
LAPD Sgt. Greg Bruce said at a 2016 court hearing that another woman had sex with the officers several times in a bid to “earn points” and have a drug case dropped.
“He told her if she had sex with him, it would count towards her working off her case,” Bruce said on the witness stand.
The woman obeyed out of fear that she’d end up again behind bars.
“What’s clear from all of the witnesses that the court heard is that these officers placed these women in a situation where they were extremely vulnerable,” said Wise, the prosecutor. “They’re in a situation where they don’t have a choice. They have the threat of either going back to jail or somehow being penalized by these officers if they don’t comply.”
All four women who accused the men of forcing them to have sex filed civil lawsuits, and so far the city has agreed to pay a total of more than $1.8 million in settlements to three of the women.
The fourth woman’s case is still pending.
The directors of the Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union representing rank-and-file officers, called both officers’ actions “disgusting” and said there was “zero tolerance” for officers who use their position to take advantage of others.
“We are sorry these women were let down and hope they are healing as best they can,” the union leaders said in a statement.
Before the sentencing, Monday, one of the victims stood before the judge and spoke of her difficult road to recovery. She said she was unable to trust others or feel safe.
Some of her worst panic attacks, she said, had two triggers: the sight of a police car or a Volkswagen Jetta.
California’s veteran senator couldn’t get the party’s endorsement. She’ll probably win anyway, but it’s a big shift.
What happens when a blue wave crashes into one of the bluest states in the union? Ask Dianne Feinstein.
The long-time California Democratic senator failed to secure her own party’s endorsement, coming in nearly 20 percentage points behind her primary challenger among delegate votes at the state party’s annual convention in San Diego over the weekend. State Senate leader Kevin de León, who is challenging Feinstein from the left, won the support of 54 percent of the Democratic delegates, compared to 37 percent support for Feinstein.
Both fell short of the 60 percent needed to secure the party endorsement, but the shock result served as a jolt of energy for the state’s progressive base as well as a clear warning shot for Feinstein, a prominent figure been in California politics since she was first elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in the 1970s. (She became that city’s mayor in 1978 after the assassination of Mayor George Moscone alongside Supervisor Harvey Milk.)
Nearly two-thirds of the party’s delegates voted against Feinstein, a startling result whose meaning should not be minimized — although it’s still likely she will be re-elected. She leads de León and other primary opponents by double digits in the polls and has substantially more campaign cash on hand. But the party convention result is another sign pointing toward major Democratic victories in the fall.
California has become one of the most liberal states in the nation, yet during her 25 years in the Senate Feinstein has voted for such Republican-friendly policies as the George W. Bush tax cuts, the invasion of Iraq, the Patriot Act, and warrantless spying on U.S. citizens. Even as the party’s platform reaffirmed a commitment to marijuana legalization over the weekend, Feinstein has remained committed in her opposition to the drug, whose recreational use is now legal statewide. While Feinstein has a strong record of supporting a ban assault weapons — an issue currently of top concern to Democrats — she found herself talking about gun control to a mostly quiet crowd at Saturday’s convention. Read more here: https://www.salon.com/2018/02/27/dianne-feinsteins-california-failure-good-news-for-democrats/
One of the things I have consistently spoken to regarding the lawlessness on the streets of Jamaica is the inability or reluctance of the police to effect arrests. In a video this weekend we saw a senior officer taking charge.….….. (sort of).……and bringing order to a situation which should have been under control long before it was done.
The pervasive lawlessness on the Island’s roadways put the lives of the traveling public and police officers at extreme risk. Every year hundreds of Jamaicans are killed in traffic crashes which are totally preventable. Traffic crashes are quite different from traffic accidents which are occurrences in which drivers played no culpable part in creating.
all hands on deck is necessary to effect the arrest.
Speeding. dangerous driving. illegal overtaking. impaired driving. tailgating. overloading. are only a few of the reasons that traffic crashes occur. On the other hand, vehicles overturning on breakaway roads in situations in which the driver was not guilty of any of the aforementioned vices are more in the vein of what is quantified as traffic accidents, et al.
Minibus drivers and the phalanx of taxi operators now traversing the roadways have made the job of the police exponentially and ever increasingly difficult even as it endangers the traveling public.
It is for this reason that I have said that senior cops must be on the streets (superintendents, SSP’s and ACP’s ) to ensure that the laws are obeyed and just as importantly, that our young officers do not get preyed upon by the vultures in waiting, when they are forced to take action.
Arrests still not been done the correct way(loop image)
It cannot be overemphasized that at the very first sign that a person being spoken to for an infraction becomes abusive and belligerent he/she must be brought under control by placing them in handcuffs.
In the video, I viewed the senior officer has the belligerent, threatening and abusive motorist by the back of the pants, good, but there was another officer standing around with the cuffs and of course the ever-present wallflower female officer standing around as a spectator.
In the chaotic scene, civilians are standing around in the sphere of operation which places them at risks and places the officers at risks themselves, including legal jeopardy. Most importantly after the cop finally placed the cuffs on the subject he allowed him to walk away mouthing off in a threatening way when he should have been decisively and immediately placed in the police vehicle.
Many people cheered the arrests, the village lawyers criticize, personally, I hope that this video will be used as a training tool (what not to do)even though luckily it ended well for the police this time.
Nothing deters people from resisting arrests than the distinct knowledge that they will be decisively and immediately arrested. Officers must use the requisite force to gain compliance, it must be done at the first sign of belligerence and done swiftly.
The Police cannot get the liberal leftist’s courts to administer the laws as it relates to resisting arrests and assaulting police officers but they damn sure can effect arrests in a way that makes would be resisters think twice and maybe three times before doing it.
This is outdated nonsense, it is not working.
This is not idle talk at the time of my service when I tell you-you are under arrests you know not to resist. As I have said repeatedly, whatever is in the training manual is not working. What is being done at the Academy is outdated, it has no relationship to what officers face on the streets. It must be scrapped and real policing training brought into the curriculum.
While it seems like ages ago, Trump lashed out at the “A Wrinkle in Time” star Sunday night following a discussion she moderated for a “60 Minutes” segment with Michigan voters.
“I woke up and I just thought,” Oprah explained, raising her hands in the air. “And I don’t like giving negativity power, so I just thought, what?”
Trump, who seems to take seriously speculation that Oprah may run against him in 2020, despite her insistence otherwise, tweeted shortly after the segment aired.
Why are these types of sentences not applied to gun criminals?
The trial in what must have been one of the most violent murder scenes ever, finally saw justice done when a combined sentence of 110 years was handed down by Judge Carol Lawrence-Beswick in the Home Circuit Court in downtown Kingston. The accused were convicted and sentenced for the animalistic and inhumane stoning and chopping to death of a mentally disabled man, 29-year-old Stanley McLean.
The family of (5)accused, which included (1) Sixty-five-year-old Velma Dean, sentenced to life in prison must serve 30 years before being eligible for parole. (2) Her husband, 69-year-old Joseph Dean, was also sentenced to life in prison and must serve 25 years before he becomes eligible for parole. (3) Two of their children, Dwight and Richard were sentenced to 20 years in prison and will become eligible for parole after serving 12 years. (4)Their sibling, Jermaine Dean, was sentenced to 15 years in prison and must serve 10 years before he is eligible for parole.
The deceased man’s father testified that he saw Velma standing over his son and chopping him mercilessly after which her sons tied a rope around his feet dragged him into the streets whereupon they set upon him and commenced chopping him. We salute this judge [in this instance] for doing the right thing, considering that the death penalty is no longer being applied. Given this judges decision to make, I would personally have ensured that they never see the sun again, but that is just me.
This family’s barbarism and callous disregard for human life encapsulate in a real way how life is viewed in our country. That a family of five people would set upon and slaughter another human being, much less one of unsound mind is a testament to a derangement which is inexplicable. Equally shocking is that no one within that family stood up and said “no”.
The most shocking statement coming out of the trial is that of the family’s attorney Ernie Smith who said that the sentences were excessive but he ’s happy there is a Court of Appeal. Sentencing a family to prison for brutishly and savagely slaughtering another human being, let alone one with a mental disorder, is viewed as excessive by an officer of the courts[sic]. A damning indictment on our sense of wrong and right, our sense of decency, morality and on our sense of humanity.
We will be watching this case further. In far too many instances cases which were appropriately decided over the years gets tossed on the slightest bit of technicality at the appellate level. In more advanced democracies appeals courts generally do not disturb decisions handed down by lower courts, unless there is clear and unequivocal evidence of impropriety or new exculpatory evidence is unearthed.
Not so in Jamaica, mere allegations have demonstrably been enough to cause cases to be tossed at the appellate level, this gives rise to the question, are dollars changing hands and if so how much? It appears many attorneys prefer to have their fights at that level which is curious on its face, why at that level? Are emotions less raw, are people less focused on cases after they have been decided at the trial level? This writer does not have that evidence but I aim to find out why it is that out of the glare of the public’s eyes, and with the cases, less fresh on people’s minds are, attorneys more willing to fight like Custer’s last stand at the appellate level?
Police-constable Carl Anthony Bailey lost his life this morning at around 5:15 am along the P J Patterson Highway in a fatal accident east of the May Pen toll booth.
Constable Bailey
The 30-year-old constable was driving his blue Toyota motor-car along the highway when he allegedly lost control of the vehicle. The car hit the left embankment and overturned. Constable Bailey was thrown from the vehicle and was run over by another vehicle and dragged for several meters. Reports indicate his head was severed from his body.
Constable Bailey’s car.
Three magazines containing 33 rounds were allegedly found at the scene. Up to the time of this reporting, the police had still not recovered his firearm.
Could the Florida School Shootings Bring About Change to American Gun Laws?
Since the 1992 Columbine High School shooting, 122 innocent people have been killed in numerous school shootings in the United States of America. The biggest loss of life was at Virginia Tech, where 33 people were killed. However, the most heinous, was at Sandy Hook Elementary, when 27 young kids had their lives gruesomely terminated. That incident shocked the conscience of millions of Americans, and non-Americans alike.
An angry then President Obama, called on Congress to pass legislation to make it harder for anyone to buy a gun. His appeal was also supported by millions of Americans who were unreserved in denouncing this brutal act, but Congress did nothing. The motive behind Congress’ inaction is the powerful National Rifle Association (NRA). This is a wealthy organization with a lot of influential people. The NRA gives millions in campaign funding to politicians from both the Democratic and Republican Parties, but mainly to Republicans. In Obama’s second year in office, the Republicans became the majority in both the House and the Senate and so they did not consider the wishes of the Americans people including the president.
Parents wait for news after a shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
However, last week’s massacre at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High school, in Parkland, Florida, which resulted in the death of 14 students and 3 teachers, could be the catalyst for a long overdue change to gun laws, in a country where the second amendment is revered. The second amendment is the law that gives all law-abiding Americans the right to bear arms. Students, some from the same Florida school where the most recent shooting occurred, and others from across the country have become activists. Many openly blasted President Donald Trump, for blaming the shootings on mental illness, rather than blaming it on how easy it is to buys guns. Guns that are getting into the hands of the wrong people who have no regard for human life. Some students even staged a “die in” outside the Whitehouse’s compound to protest their anger and displeasure.
This movement is gaining traction and could be a game changer. Consequently, Trump has announced that the so-called Bump Stock — a kind of contraption that converts a semi-automatic weapon to fully automatic be banned. This was the same device used by the deranged gunman in Las Vegas to kill 58 people attending a concert. After the Las Vegas carnage, many people including this writer heard of Bump Stock for the first time, and although so many lives were lost, Trump and the Congress of the United States did nothing to ban the device.
Donald Trump
But now, he has decided to act. It shows that the students’ voices are been heard, that an obstinate, self-centered protagonist like Trump, may finally capitulate to the demand of the students and other proponents, who favor changes to the current gun laws. This ostensibly causes the Whitehouse to pay attention, perhaps much to the chagrin of the NRA, who gave an estimated 300 hundred million dollar to Trump’s successful presidential campaign.
I am not naïve, however, to believe that there will be any significant changes to guns laws in the US. Lawmakers in Florida recently voted down a motion to discuss banning the AR-15 rifle, the same Semi-Automatic weapon used to murder the aforementioned 17 people in that state.
You have to ask where are their conscience? Is the NRA that powerful or some American politicians don’t have the conviction to stand up for the victims and their families, or, are they downright stupid?
As long as the NRA continues to exist, you can bet your bottom dollar that no significant change will be made to gun laws in that country, although I would be the first to welcome it. They will lobby the politicians in Washington and state houses throughout the U.S., which will influence them not to even vaguely consider any change. Some Americans are obsessed with guns, and they are aware that it is their constitutional rights to bear arms, and will not concede an inch to ensure that guns don’t get into the hands of the wrong people.
I don’t know what it will take before the Americans realize that guns kill people. Let’s wait and see if there will be any tangible change after this protest ends.
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I have been following case dispositions and sentences meted out in individual cases and what I found gave me much cause for alarm. This prompted me to begin writing about the discrepancies, inconsistencies, and disparities in the way the courts are approaching the dispensation of justice. Repeat murderers are granted bail as a matter of course. Judges argue the question of bail should not be seen as a means of punishment and as such, every person accused of a crime is entitled to bail.
So the next time you hear judges proffer the lies they have been spouting on this issue, understand that the law gives them ample cover to protect the public from dangerous killers. When they release alleged murderers back onto the streets they do so of their own volition and not as a consequence of the dictates of the laws.
One murder accused was granted bail up to six separate times, killing each of the six times he was allowed out on bail after being charged with murder, yes murder. Then he finally decided to simply flee the jurisdiction. Light touch sentences for violent egregious crimes under the guise that the courts must assist offenders, and a general mindset that the feelings of crime victims do not count. The social conscience and the liberal thinking of judges take precedence over the dictates of the laws they are sworn to follow and uphold.
Recently the Police prepared a document which outlined some of those very discrepancies in the sentences meted out for similar crimes. Having seen first-hand how certain judges treat violent and repeat offenders with a cavalier attitude I was already conversant of what obtained in many courtrooms on a daily basis. For years the nation’s police officers have complained about the light sentences and the revolving doors which the justice system became as a result of the nonchalance displayed by most judges towards violent criminals. As a frontline cop, I know all too well how dangerous guys we arrested would laugh and brag that they would be out on bail in no time.They were always right. Sure Judges are supposed to operate impartially and free from political intrusion into their work, that cannot be overemphasized but we must never forget that with that degree of freedom comes a tremendous responsibility to be judicious and be good stewards of that sacred trust. That trust cannot be a foundation on which is built and created, a monarchistic system of unaccountability and malfeasance.
The unprecedented uprising of the Judges against the duly constituted Prime Minister’s authority was icing on the cake and I believe that once and for all that veneer of impartiality has been removed from what most police officers knew was a façade. Sure each case is different and each case has mitigating components, nevertheless, judges should not disregard the law and most importantly the very real feelings and emotions of crime victims and supplant them with their own sense of far-left social liberalism.
There have always been great judges in our country and there are also really bad judges as well. I know for a fact that many law enforcement officers literally gave up trying to run down criminals at great risk to themselves only to see them returned to the streets the same day. When Judges and the defense attorneys graduate from the very same left-wing Institution a phone call fixes many problems. Certain attorneys can get anything done regardless of the crime his/her client committed, and oh by the way the law be damned.
The average person looks at the police in the fight against criminal networks, understandably because the police are the first and most visible line of defense between us and those who would do us harm. The question of corruption is also viewed much the same way. It is, therefore, an improper and misguided attribution of culpability to the police alone when in many cases they did their jobs. The courts have a huge responsibility in the containment of crime and it has failed miserably. As the final arbiter when the courts fail it creates the domino effect which we are witnessing in the massive failure of the justice system today.
The police cited almost two hundred (200) verifiable cases of murder in which the killers were allowed out on bail in cases they should be locked up for. To date, there has been no meaningful response from the Court Management Services, the agency which speaks for judges, and neither is there a response from Delroy Chuck the Justice Minister. Those cases reflect only what the police can confirm, which indicates that the problem is far more serious and systemic than we know.
Jamaican judges should not be allowed to usurp our democracy with their far left liberal worldviews which are killing our people and destroying our country. There is only one way to deal appropriately with criminals who kill and that is with maximum force. Criminals must fear the power of the state, the state must fear the power of law-abiding citizens. In 2010 a huge coming together of criminal gangs tested the power and resolve of the state. The security forces went in to re-establish the authority of the state and were shockingly maligned by both political parties for political mileage. Since then, the weaponry of the criminal underworld has gotten exponentially more modern and sophisticated. The question is, will the Government and people be able to count on the security forces to save them the next time the gangland forces decide to flex their muscles? Chew on that for a moment.
The idea that change cannot be made through grassroots advocacy is not borne out by the facts. In 2010 I began a personal mission of bringing to the fore issues of crime affecting our country with a view to stimulating debate and discussion on the issue.
Having served as a police officer in our country gave me a unique perspective to try and bring a voice to the issue of policing in a way serving officers never could because of the constraints placed on their right to free speech. I was under no illusion that this would be an easy endeavor, I was not delusional about the level of pushback which would come considering our country’s hatred for the rule of law. As such, the death threats, name-calling, and other negatives which have been hurled at me was no surprise to me, I allowed them to simply roll off me like water from a Duck’s back.
I thought whatever negatives were being hurled at me would pale in comparison to remaining silent, not speaking truth to power. I thought if I could get one person to listen to reason, just one person to understand that we need our police officers in order to have a country it would be worth it. The very people who would like to see the disbandment of the Jamaica Constabulary Force and the firing of all its officers’ clamor for other people to take their place, without realizing that what those other people would be doing is called policing. The moral of that little nugget is that we cannot have a society without the rule of law. There can be no real growth and prosperity in an atmosphere of criminality and chaos.
Over seven years later the message is finally seeping through. Other Jamaicans are finally starting to realize that though we have far too many people in our police department who shouldn’t be there we must give support to our officers while the systems put in place remove bad actors from the stage. Now a senior police commander in Clarendon Superintendent David White, is calling for limits to judges discretion in certain instances. He is going to take a lot of flack from the regular peanut gallery, “who does he think he is talking about their gods in that way, they have a right to do what they see fit, how dare you criticize them”[sic].
Come tomorrow the papers will be filled with the fiery venom from the bloviating fools who defend these ultra-liberal, judges as if they are unaccountable to anyone. They will blab on and on about the sanctity of the separation of powers as if the separation of powers were not enshrined into law by men and may be changed, altered, and amended to fit the times by other men and women.
The commander argues that light sentences and undue delay in concluding cases are not in the best interest of justice. You think. This statement from the police was once unheard of in Jamaica, though not in police departments in the modern world.
For years I have been pushing the Government to change the gun laws by adding greater punitive components which ensure that violent offenders who commit crimes using firearms are locked away for good. That process,(mandatory minimum) for gun crimes is one step in reducing violent crimes by simply keeping offenders in prison where they belong and deterring others from committing violent crimes.
Venesha Phillips, PNP councilor for the Papine division and caretaker for the Eastern St Andrew constituency, is now declaring there should be No More Asking Criminals To Cease Fire, Pursue Them Relentlessly she demands. Hmm.… Better late than never, I never quite understood the concept of begging warring factions to lay down their arms unless by that statement you are admitting that what the country faces is indeed an undeclared state of civil war. Imagine having a peace management unit, not to mention those who proffer such an idea and are a part of that anti-police growth industry?
It is on that basis that I have argued over the years that traditional policing methods does not apply. The country has a duty to neutralize those threats before we begin any process of community policing much less the laughable concept of restorative justice, (given the context). Anything short of an all-out war on the criminal gangs which result in body bags, or their member’s complete surrender and capitulation to the rule of law is a mockery of law enforcement.
It will most assuredly have dangerous underlying consequences for the future like a simmering volcano and a country sitting idly waiting to be vaporized by boiling lava. It is stupid, there is no respect coming from the Prime Minister or the Minister of National Security, there is no cohesive policy which includes both political parties making it clear that there will be no refuge, no sanctuary for lawbreakers.
As such the problem of murders on the Island has been wrongly and incorrectly framed for years, as mere criminals and corner crews, not violent murderous gangs which have no compunction about coming together to challenge the authority of the state, as occurred in Tivoli Gardens in 2010.
Despite the glaring reality of this clear and present phenomenon the nation’s leaders look to and listen to bottom-feeding crustaceans like Horace Levy who heads the Peace Management Unit,( a group which is part of the anti-police growth industry). People like Levy has a seat at the table on crime while the group he heads is against law enforcement officers, even as Levy has been a vexing anti-police antagonistic troll for years.
For years Horace Levy has stridently and aggressively refuted claims that the number of criminal gangs operating on the Island has been exploding in numbers. Despite having zero data, training or experience in law enforcement Levy arguments held sway.What Levy says are corner crews was not what police faced. The sense of innocence and youthful associations inherent in Levy’s characterization held sway, however, when police face the very same men they are heavily armed violent killers.
There is a search on for a new commissioner of police, the pickers are flawed and so whoever they chose will be flawed. Nevertheless, changing the commissioner is only a tiny bit of what needs to be done. The longer the nation waits to place policies on the table that are not about vote buying and employ a real cop to execute those strategies there will be no change. They have it all wrong.
“We nuh inna di INDECOM business, straight up!” Said, one Resident.
“See da community right now, we nuh need INDECOM..INDECOM a buil’ a bagga gunman inna Jamaica enuh,” chimed another
[Councillor for the Papine Division Venesha Phillips]
“What residents witnessed this morning was as an assault on the police and on the community”.
“Understand that while we have no difficulty with INDECOM, we want to make sure that citizens feel safe. And anything that looks like the police will be placed in a situation where they are going to pull back, for whatever reason, then the citizens are not going to have it,” expressed Phillips.
“This community is severely broken and the police must be able to take charge of the ground. So nothing that will get in the way of that will be tolerated.”
Residents were responding to the upsurge of violence in their community of Jungle August Town St. Andrew. According to published reports, gunmen invaded and opened fire killing 35-year-old David Stewart, a correctional officer at the Tower Street Adult Correctional Center.
This is what officers face when they go out to make arrests they do need our support.
Two police officers who responded and were engaged in processing the crime scene were attacked by the heavily armed gangsters resulting in injury to one officer. The police were reportedly forced to retreat from the scene in the face of superior firepower.
Guess who showed up? You guessed it .….…INDECOM! In the face of the people’s anger and disgust the INDECOM agent clearly tone deaf at what was being conveyed he went on to advance the following, ” we are always here to investigate impartially.”That nonsense train had long left the station, the agent was clearly trying to save his own ass.
That drew the ire of the beleaguered now less blinkered residents. Seemingly at least some of them are beginning to awake to the reality that INDECOM in its present configuration is a crime enhancement agency. This writer and this publication is dedicated to the rule of law as such we want crooked cops in prison.
A recent picture of a young women with a lethal weapon
Nevertheless, as I have maintained since the act was being debated in 2010 the idea though not lacking in merit, was being done as a punitive redress to the criminal rights fraternity, and as such the operational tenets of the law were flawed.
Additionally, the Commissioner of INDECOM,Terrence Williams, disqualified himself as an impartial investigator, casting his lot with the other rabble rousing bottom feeders who pretend to be human rights advocates. As a result, Williams’s cantankerous and unnecessarily confrontational relationship with the JCF, the nation’s chief law enforcement agency, was uncalled for and should not have occurred.
Brazen images many Jamaicans do not see.
By his actions(meeting and conferencing with criminal rights activists )while in the role as commissioner of INDECOM, Terrence Williams, by his own actions created a toxic atmosphere which could only result in a rapid growth in crime.
Year over year murder continues to climb, despite calls from the police and supporters like this publication to the authorities that the INDECOM act is onerous, unjust and a driver of crime, successful administrations of both political parties have done nothing to repeal and redo a common-sense law which we all can be proud of.
To add insult to injury the narcissistic media whore of a commissioner Terrence Williams was given a second term as “a direct fuck you” to the police. Be it understood that there is no single issue driving crime in our country, there is a cornucopia of issues contributing to its growth. None more than the albatross called INDECOM around the neck of the nation’s crime officers in their ability to do their jobs.
Maybe, just damn maybe, the people , the real owners of Jamaica, the every man/woman from up in August Town to every nook a cranny in Salt Marsh St James will rise up and say no more. No more foreign funded sellouts to tell us how to police our communities with their satellites perched in their ivory towers up at Mona and New Kingston.
Thirty years ago, I migrated from Jamaica to Toronto, Canada, it was the first time I left the shores of Jamaica I was awestruck by the diversity of the city. I was also taken aback by the vibrancy of the black community, and the impact and contributions they have made to this remarkable city, prior to my arrival here.
Having said that, the black community was a favourite target for Toronto predominantly white police service. We felt that we were targeted because of who we were, and several young black men were shot and killed by the police, mostly under questionable circumstances. A lot has changed since 1988, Toronto has grown exponentially in almost every facet , it’s now the fourth largest city in the North America and is considered the most diverse city on the planet.
The majority of the members of the police service are still white, which doesn’t truly reflect our diversity. However, on April 17, 2015, history was made when Mark Saunders a black man of Jamaican lineage was appointed the first black police chief in the services’ 181 year history. Saunders who was born in England, is a veteran of the service and has served in numerous capacities over his thirty plus years. We as a people in this city have come a long way, but I never envision that in my lifetime I would see a black police chief in Toronto.
We have black politicians, but those folks are elected by the people, the chief on the other hand, is selected by the police services board. And although the board’s ethnic makeup is diverse, I was still not expecting the appointment of a black chief. To see that come to fruition was a major development for blacks in this city and a very proud moment for our community.
Toronto Police Service Transformation Since then, Toronto Police Service has undergone a major transformation to make the service more lean. The police board and the mayor want the service to change with the times, and so, they believe they can’t continue with status quo. Among other things, the board is a proponent of using less personnel and relying more on technology to carry out their duties.
Chief Mark Saunders
One of their primary concerns is the annual operating budget, which has grown exponentially to $M1005.1, in 2017. Most of the money is paid in salary, so a strategy to shrink the budget evolved, they have decided not hire any new officers in 2017. Backed by the police union, members of the service have become disgruntled and began complaining that they are short staffed and over-worked. The officers are arguing that their lives are at risk, and the public is underserved.
They have been campaigning through the media that their concerns have fallen on deaf ears, and have decided to have a no-confidence vote against Chief Saunders. This vote is symbolic, and will not remove Saunders as Chief. But doing this will ensure that their concerns will be addressed more expeditiously.
Should Members of the JCF Do Likewise? Toronto Police Service is modern, equipped with some of the best technology, the officer are well paid with an excellent pension, they worked in a law-abiding society and operate independently of any political interference. On the other side of the spectrum, members of the JCF, worked in squalid conditions, hardly any modern technology, are grossly underpaid, gets a measly pension upon retirement and have to police some of the most vicious people on the planet, who have no regards for the rules of law.
Toronto Police officers
And yet, they still perform their duties under these conditions. I think it’s time for members of the JCF to have a stronger voice to stand up to the politicians and demand better pay, better working conditions, which includes reliable service vehicles and better barracks to sleep in. Recently, I received a video on WhatsApp, showing a rooster crowing in rafters of in the barrack room of a police station. The officer who made the video, made light of the fact they he was trying to get some rest and was awaken by the crowing rooster. It’s shameful to think that police officers are treated like this by the government, and when they failed they are mercilessly criticized, meanwhile they are the ones risking their lives to protect those of their critics.
Look at the uphill battle the Jamaica Police Federation is fighting for its member for a long overdue salary increase. I converted the Jamaica dollar to Canadian and U.S. currencies and what they are paying police officers in Jamaica is an insult, literally a fiasco. Yet, the public demand so much of them, when they are ill-equipped to carry out their duties. They work in sub-human conditions, abused by the public and is a scapegoat for corruption in Jamaica.
They even passed a legislation which threatens to send members to prison if they leave without giving six months notice. These draconian measures will discourage smart people from joining the force and encourage the exodus of personnel who realize that being a cop in Jamaica isn’t worth it. Compared to their Jamaican counterpart, Toronto police officers are working in luxury, relatively speaking.
Jamaican police officers
Nevertheless, they have launched a no-confidence vote against their chief. Meanwhile, my former colleagues are threatened with imprisonment if they leave the force without proper notification. If only these Toronto cops come to their senses and realize how good they have it. Look at the dichotomy, the poor Jamaican cops who are in the crosshairs of Jamaican gunmen are not allowed to leave the force on their own volition and cops here in Toronto who seemingly have everything are whining and complaining about their working conditions while being handsomely compensated.
The time has come for some constitutional challenges for the rights of police officers in Jamaica, who are controlled by senseless laws and regulations. Some of these laws are antiquated, and do not reflect the modern times we are living in.
They should be allowed to strike or protest just like any other employee of the government. Although symbolic, the Jamaican police should emulate their Toronto counterpart and have a no-confidence vote against The Minister of National Security, whose performance has been abysmal. His poor management of the crime situation in Jamaica and his blatant attack on former commissioner Quallo are strong evidence of his failures. Enough is enough.
One of the topics I have pounded on over the years that I have been involved in social commentary is the need for better supervision at all levels of the JCF. None of the suggestions I have outlined and hammered on have been followed with the exception of in a few isolated cases. Today I see headlines with officers who served in foreign police departments advancing the very same ideas I have advanced years ago and almost daily. Never mind that British Cops were brought into the country to tell us what we who served in the JCF already knew and knew how to do.
I will continue to hammer home these points until a foreigner of enough standing brings it to the attention of our pseudo colonialist leaders forcing action on these issues.
WENEEDTOSEELEADERSHIPFROMTHEGAZETTEDRANKS.
Young officers in the streets wrestling with belligerent, aggressive subjects with no backup support. Obviously poorly trained in effecting simple arrests it is clear that the techniques being taught at the academy are outdated.
This is a staple, we have seen it in far too many instances and what has the police hierarchy done? Absolutely nothing. The leadership of the JCF has never really been high on quality leadership, in fact, the general gist of their understanding of their roles has always been ‘chief oppressors”.
The welfare of most has never been central to their mission and it could easily be argued that for many young smart members just entering the force the old guard would rather say farewell. But this is not about what individual commanders do. It is about the fact that there is no discernable strategy of leadership which exist outside the posing for cameras from behind desks and the puffery inherent in their statements which seeks to separate themselves from the foot soldiers who are actually doing the work.
Senior Police officers in the streets is not a panacea for ensuring the protection and guidance of younger officers. In fact, as we have seen in Boscobel St.Mary rece3ntly, hooligans blocked streets and brought traffic to a standstill while Assistant Commissioner Norman Heywood stood there looking like a cockroach in a yard full of chickens, as bedlam reigned.
If I had the power Heywood would have been out of the force and could only rejoin as a District Constable based on what I witnessed. When senior officers are present it reduces the likelihood that younger officers will make some of the mistakes easily made by young officers. It also reduces the likelihood of officers receiving bribes. The authority of the rule of law must be respected or we must turn over the country to the murderers and rapists who control the streets and dispense with the charade. That respect and deference must begin in Jamaica House, it must happen in Kings House and it must be enshrined and codified in Gordon House.
A young female constable came up to me early one morning at the Red Hills Police station, we had just returned from an operation. I was one of the detectives from Constant Spring who went to assist in the operation. I was an acting corporal, she a constable. She: Corporal I want a transfer from up here I cannot make any money”! Me: You mean to tell me that they don’t pay you each month? She moved away from me some, looked at me scornfully from head to toe, then slowly slithered away.
TIMETODROPHANDS
With principled, no-nonsense sub-officers and gazetted officers engaged in day to day policing those officers with mal-intent are less inclined to engage in the disgusting practice of soliciting and accepting bribes. It is beyond unconscionable, that young officers are set upon in the streets and when they respond the police high command is duplicitously silent. How cowardly and spineless are these idiots if they cannot stand on the principles of the JCF Act and defend their subordinates?
Given the lack of leadership from those who are supposed to lead and the Andrew Holness Administration’s blinkered march to disempowering the police the men and women of the JCF must make a decision whether or not they want to risk imprisonment by arresting anyone. They don’t want you to do your jobs then don’t do anything. Collect your salaries and go home to your families.
At a time when civilized nations are fully exploiting their full potentials given the technological advancements of the Internet and Social Media and other breakthroughs, Jamaica is hollering on the top of mountains about 1.1% economic growth. Now I rather see 1.1 % growth than a recession in the economy but our country can do exponentially better. The only thing hampering our progress is the Government’s reluctance to enforce the laws and pass new ones which send a strong message that criminals have no sanctuary in our country.
The Jamaican Government,(Opposition party included ) cannot be dense to the extent it does not understand the consequences crime has on the economy. According to a policy paper produced by the world bank a high rate of violent crime can have many adverse repercussions: 1 It has a negative impact on the investment climate and can deter or delay both domestic and foreign investment, and hence growth. 2 It leads to higher cost of doing business, because of the need to employ different forms of security, and diverts investment away from business expansion and productivity improvement, and may lead to a less than optimal operating strategy. 2 It leads to business losses, arising from looting, arson, theft, extortion, and fraud. 3 It leads to loss of output because of reduced hours of operation (including avoiding night shifts) or loss of workdays arising from outbreaks of violence, and avoidance of some types of economic activity. 4 It also reduces output because of the temporary (from injury) or permanent (from murder) exit of individuals from the labor force. In the latter case, the loss is not just current output, but the output in the remaining years of the individual’s working life. 5 It can also cause a permanent shut-down of firms or relocation to less crime-prone countries. 2 It erodes the development of human capital as well as social capital and thus constrains the potential for growth. The crime situation in Jamaica seems to be an important reason for migration since the fear of crime significantly reduces the quality of life. Crime and violence have also been blamed for slowing down the rate of return of migrants back to Jamaica. Also, crime forces otherwise productive individuals to occasionally exit the labor force because of violent injury to themselves or close associates, or because of social unrest in the community. Violence in some communities also causes schools to close periodically. Moreover, home and community instability is not conducive to learning and educational objectives.
[“We have seen the evidence we will await the outcome of the Investigations in the meantime we stand with our officers”].
Where have I heard that statement before? Oh, that is the standard statement real police departments put out to the media when their officers are accused of doing something wrong. That curt yet professional statement says two things. (1) We are not going to engage in the demonizing of our officers and (2) Don’t come to us wait for the investigations to conclude.
JAMAICA The Police High Command has ordered an investigation into an incident, captured on video, depicting members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) embroiled in an altercation with members of the public. During the incident, Gleaner photographer Rudolph Brown was pepper sprayed by a policewoman. Persons who witnessed or who were involved in the incident at the Silver Slipper Plaza in Cross Roads, St Andrew, on Tuesday, have been urged to contact the Inspectorate of Constabulary at 906‑5325 or 754‑8217 to share any information they may have.
This was the tight scene around the officers as they sought to do their jobs and a had their working spaces invaded by Brown and others.
Notice the difference here? What exactly do the idiots in the so-called high command of the JCF expect that anyone who shows up to give evidence is going to say? Are they going to show up to give evidence supportive of the police or are they 100% inclined to tell lies about what they saw even though they may not even have been there? Whats wrong with the video why a determination cannot be made using the very footage the PAJ and its affiliates are using to cry foul?
The very stance of the police high command, jittery and panicked in its statements sends the wrong message, almost as if the officers are in the wrong even without an investigation!
SO LET’S LOOKAT A FEWFACTS
Rudolph Brown
Brown reported that he was in the Cross Roads area when he witnessed a commotion, which seemed to be caused by police attempts to arrest a man.
(1) A journalist on assignment has a responsibility to obey police officers commands to move away when they are executing their duties. Rudolph Brown wasn’t even on assignment, which makes his arguments doubly dubious and tenuous.
(2)He subsequently took out his smartphone and began recording the incident. He was instructed by a police sergeant to stop recording, but he continued to record the incident after identifying himself as a media worker.
Why was there a need for Brown to identify himself as a journalist if he was at a safe distance from the officers? (3)Brown alleges, The sergeant then told a constable to pepper spray him. Why would the subofficer give the order to pepper spray Brown if he was a safe distance away? Isn’t it clear that this has nothing to do with the fact that Brown who was not officially on duty took it upon himself to get in the way of an active and fluid arrest in which a suspect wasn’t even yet subdued and refused lawful orders to move away?
(4) Isn’t the fact that Brown alleges that he was sprayed in his eyes a clear and decisive bit of evidence that he was very close to the officers. That he represented a risk and a perceived threat to their safety in the lawful execution of their duties?
Does anyone really believe that this is worthy of an investigation or is this just another example of another piece of shit who decides that the police cannot tell him what to do and got burned in the process? You see the only thing I fault the officers with, is not arresting him and let him cool his heels in a cell so that the next time he is going about his business and he sees officers arresting a subject he does either of two things,(1) keep walking or (2) videotape from a safe distance.
.….….….….….….….…..
Clifford Blake
There was not a single word of support for the officers from the acting Commissioner of Police who couldn’t wait for Commissioner George Quallo’s chair to be cooled before plopping his ass in it. The Media Association of Jamaica Ltd (MAJ), The Press Association of Jamaica (PAJ) all came out in defense of Brown and demanding all kinds of Investigations. Not a word from the known anti-police acting commissioner of Police Clifford Blake.
Despite not having a single word of support for the officers who were doing their jobs Clifford Blake decided to gain a little goodwill for himself at the expense of his colleagues.
In a statement, Blake said he’s aware of concerns being raised in the public domain that cops may be even more enticed to request and accept bribes from motorists. But he said misconduct in any form is unacceptable and will not be countenanced by the Police High Command.
That ought to get him some raves in the peanut gallery, hopefully, he will be out of that office real soon. No one wants our police officers to ask for bribes and this writer is stridently opposed to dirty cops. In fact, I was working with a cop who stopped a minibus and asked the driver for lunch money. The conductor threw a $5 bill into our car and sped off.
I demanded that he drive the bus down which he reluctantly did and I got out of the car and handed the money back to the conductor to cheers and praise from the passengers. I ordered my colleague to take me back to the station which he did, I promptly made a report to Mister Noël Asphall our boss. The officer in question was a Corporal, I was a constable. I was able to order him around because he had compromised himself and his authority to me. The damage he did to himself and the force was immeasurable. He knows who he is.
Nevertheless, DCP Blake could have circulated an internal memo without seeking the glare of the public stage to embarrass the officers so unfortunate to be in his charge. On a point of note, however, I wonder how many mini-buses Clifford Blake owned as a police officer and does he own any now? Leadership DCP Blake is criticizing in private and complimenting in public. You see Mister Blake, some people were born great and others had greatness thrust upon them. you decide where you fit, do remember my man you also had a mighty lot of luck and a lot of goodwill you haven’t earned. Walk good.….….……
I am so tired of the sense of entitlement Jamaicans have when it comes to subjecting themselves to the authority of law enforcement. We can talk all day about the fact that the country is lawless, we can talk about corruption in some police officers as corruption exists in Parliament, the judiciary and every corner of national life. We can talk until we are blue in the face about causation and we still won’t solve this problem of a people who think that they should obey no laws.
On the occasion that the Bruce Golding’s administration introduced legislation which we now know as the INDECOM (act), I argued that there were already layers of police oversight. Adding a sixth oversight agency would cripple the ability of the police to do their jobs on the one hand, and on the other, there would be massive increases in attacks and assaults on police and an inexorable upward trend in violent crimes as police officers would drop their hands.
Bruce Golding gave the nation INDECOM and all its side effects, as well as the Tivoli affair and God, know what else?
No one listened, you see in Jamaican there are two polar opposites and a thin line of people in the middle, [deep rural folks] who provide the bodies, the sacrifice who join the police department. The two polar points are of the same mindset ultimately they just have different perches and power.
THETWOPOINTS
(1) A vast majority of illiterates, highly opinionated, they cannot be educated outside of their core beliefs. (2) A small educated cadre who appoint themselves the [elites], these are the new bourgeoisie, a little education does that to them. Heads so far up their asses they would need a fire hose to clean the shit from their faces in order for them to appreciate their own stupidity.
In fairness to the bourgeoisie, I cannot blame them for placing themselves above the laws when the process they have used to make themselves untouchable have worked for decades. The blame rests squarely on the doorsteps of the lapdog police high command. This body, save for a few exceptions, absolutely makes me nauseous when I think about its cowardice and lack of backbone.
James Forbes allowed himself to be used by Bruce Bicknell and lost everything.
Years of being yard-boys to politicians and others in the upper crust, not to mention the low-lives from the lower caste with some money to throw around have effectively removed the luster and shine which befits the office of senior police commanders. No case more sums up that [lapdog-ism] sic than that of James Forbes who threw away his career, his honor and dignity not to mention his pension. Forbes was fined $800’000 or six months imprisonment when all he had to do is tell his so-called friend “go pay for the fucking ticket.” In case you are wondering about the massive fine, those are reserved for Police officers.[sic] Found guilty of perverting the course of justice they showed Forbes no mercy.
Forbes and far too many in the upper echelons of the force still do not understand that the only reason some within the society crave associations with them is to use them when they get themselves in scrapes such as a speeding ticket. These elitists have no expectation that they should be subject to the courts like common serfs. Once that police power is gone so too are the fairweather friends.
PM Andrew Holness
There are two sets of standards one for the old money people and those who passed through the doors of the UWI (police excluded) and then a set of rules for everyone else. The criteria which separated the society into castes are blood-line, and money. Education has emerged as another component which propels some, once on the outside front and center into the upper caste. That of course if one never made the mistake of getting stained with the stink of being a police officer.
The event of over a hundred judges walking off their jobs to make a statement in a clear power play against the Prime Minister is a testament that the rules do not apply to them. The events triggering the judge’s actions did not affect a single judge in that group. Clearly, their actions were one of power and standing.
Generally, Police officers, teachers, nurses and other public sector workers are penalized by their superiors for daring to stand up for their right to better wages and working conditions. Gums of all and sundry flap incessantly, each with their own opinions on the actions of those workers, very few with words of empathy and or support. Judges walk off the job and no one utters a word of condemnation at their power play against the duly elected Prime Minister.
There will not be any lessening of violent crimes by changing who the commissioner is, in the same way blaming the commissioner for the state of affairs is n’t helpful. We must begin to face some facts if ever we are going to begin the process of turning back the epidemic of gun crimes. There has to be an understanding that there are more people returning as deportees than as regular returning residents.
Whose idea is it that layers and layers of oversight and harassment without even decent uniforms for our police officers add up to a good law enforcement agency? These nonsensical studies coming out of the UWI has no basis in reality but they are heavy on grandiosity. Security guards have better uniforms, better weapons, better vehicles, work in better buildings and are better paid than our police officers yet there are efforts afoot to change the designation of the JCF from a police force to a police service. What utter and unadulterated bullshit.
The force currently stands at less than full strength, it is short approximately 2’000 officers. According to International standards of police to citizen ratio, Jamaica is woefully short of officers. The JCF has approximately 12000 members at present it is unable to meet recruitment goals and on the back end, officers are leaving the department at a clip of over 50 each month. That number does not include deaths, dismissals, and retirements.
Recent attempts by the Government as part of its ZOSO legislation to hold cops against their will and criminalize them if the leave without first giving 6 months advanced notice will not help. As a consequence potential recruits will certainly have second thoughts about joining up all things considered.
The stress derived from overwork, low pay and no appreciation will further erode the morale of officers on the streets. Crime will inexorably increase given that those with the power continue to blame and mischaracterize the nation’s crime problem as a function of the police as against their own dismal failings.
Officers on the scene where their colleague Constable Leighton Hanson was murdered by an assailant who grabbed his weapon and took his life.
The simple solutions of modernizing the force by treating officers better and with respect are ignored. As the Government aided by the opposition chases down hifalutin alien concepts cooked up in the (intellectual ghetto). Providing police officers decent places in which to work, basics accouterments like uniforms and computers would help as against expansive studies and convoluted strategies antithetical to our unique circumstances.
Better pay and remunerations for overtime hours are helpful when officers are called on to produce while simultaneously weeding out dead-woods cops is recommended.How about legislation which removes from the hands of the nations [recently declared Gods] hands, the ability to release murderers back onto the streets regardless of the number of times they kill.
Truth in sentencing and mandatory minimum sentencing for violent crimes committed with the use of guns goes a long way in aiding law enforcement in doing what societies expect from them.How about showing some damn respect to these men and women who risk their lives for the sorry asses of those who sit and criticize. Why would I risk my life for a nation of people like that which exist in our nation today?
The answers are right there, the administration can apply simple common sense approaches as I outlined above, or it can continue on this fool’s errand it is on devised by their idiotic leftist friends up at Mona.
Instead of honoring the security forces Portia Simpson Miller commissioned a kangaroo inquiry for the sole purpose of scoring political points.
Jamaica is well on it’s way to becoming what Colombia was before and through the 80’s and 90’s. Events of 2010 ought to have been a clarion call to make the necessary changes. The moronic leaders opted instead to blame the last set of people who had culpability, (the security forces), and the sheeple[sic] went along with the ridiculousness. This country is paying dearly for that betrayal and will continue to do so until someone has the vision to do what is right.
Police officers in the process of effecting an arrest have a right to expect a certain degree of safety not just their own but for that of the offender being arrested. As such the laws give officers the right and power to tell onlookers to step back and give them a wide berth to do their jobs. When an officer is so engaged in the lawful pursuits of his/her duty and so orders onlookers to move on or move away the party so ordered must move. If they refuse to move the police may use as much force as is necessary to move the onlooker who may and usually is arrested for failing to move on.
No one, Press or otherwise has a right to tell officers they are not going to move away, it matters not who you are. A press ID is not a license to disrespect or disobey a lawful order given by a law enforcement officer in the lawful execution of his/her duties. I plead with Jamaican officers to be a lot more forceful and decided when effecting arrests as long as the offender being arrested decides to resist. Whether the person being arrested is Andrew Holness, Peter Phillips or anyone else once you tell the offender they are under arrest and they are ordered to turn around and place their hands behind their backs and they refuse, immediately apply the necessary force to effect the arrest.
That includes taking the offender to the ground and placing him/her in handcuffs and removing the offender from the scene immediately. Any person who interferes must also be arrested and placed in custody. We cannot have a country where any person believes they are above being respectful of our law enforcement officers. No one is above the damn laws, I love the female officer not just a flower in uniform. What the lapdog incompetent high command should do is tell the Press Association to go to hell and stay there but they won’t they are too shit scared to understand the powers the laws give them. There are far too many ignorant, lawless, opinionated people living on this little swath of land and then there are others with overinflated senses of self.
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