House Committee Urges Increased Powers For INDECOM Boss

Terrence Williams
Terrence Williams

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.

The com­mit­tee has also accept­ed a request from Commissioner Williams to give INDECOM inves­ti­ga­tors the same author­i­ty that a police con­sta­ble has in a Coroner’s Inquest, which would allow them to request the hold­ing of post-mortem exam­i­na­tions. The pro­posed amend­ment to Section 5 (93) of the Coroner’s Act would read: “Where a death is alleged to have been caused by a mem­ber of the secu­ri­ty forces, spec­i­fied offi­cial or oth­er agent of the State, the Commissioner of the Independent Commission of Investigations shall ­— (a) in respect of each parish, assign an inves­ti­ga­tor to car­ry out func­tions in like man­ner as a des­ig­nat­ed police offi­cer under this Act; (b) give writ­ten notice of such des­ig­na­tion to the coro­ner; and © cause a des­ig­na­tion to be pub­lished in the Gazette.” The com­mit­tee also accept­ed that there should be an amend­ment to the Coroner’s Act, stat­ing that: “Where an inves­ti­ga­tor des­ig­nat­ed under the pro­vi­sion of sec­tion 3 is informed or dis­cov­ers that a body or part there­of is lying with­in the parish of his des­ig­na­tion as a result of the act or omis­sion of a mem­ber of the secu­ri­ty forces, spec­i­fied offi­cials or oth­er agent of the state, it shall be law­ful for the des­ig­nat­ed inves­ti­ga­tor, in his dis­cre­tion, to direct any duly qual­i­fied med­ical prac­ti­tion­er to con­duct a post-mortem exam­i­na­tion of the body, and said des­ig­nat­ed inves­ti­ga­tor shall be respon­si­ble for col­lect­ing and sub­mit­ting to the com­mis­sion or oth­er com­pe­tent author­i­ty any evi­dence required to facil­i­tate fur­ther foren­sic, bal­lis­tic or oth­er sci­en­tif­ic analysis.”On the oth­er hand, the com­mit­tee for­mal­ly request­ed the estab­lish­ment of a non-exec­u­tive board to over­see the commission’s work.

This board would pro­vide over­sight on inter­nal gov­er­nance mat­ters affect­ing the organ­i­sa­tion, includ­ing input on poli­cies with respect to human resources, pub­lic rela­tions, bud­get­ing, etcetera,” the report said. Read more here : http://​www​.jamaicaob​serv​er​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​H​o​u​s​e​-​c​o​m​m​i​t​t​e​e​-​u​r​g​e​s​-​i​n​c​r​e​a​s​e​d​-​p​o​w​e​r​s​-​f​o​r​-​I​N​D​E​C​O​M​-​b​oss — — –_​45621

2 thoughts on “House Committee Urges Increased Powers For INDECOM Boss

  1. Yes, sirs! To all my PNP and JLP ide­o­log­i­cal police offi­cers of the Jamaican Constabulary Force, your polit­i­cal par­ties are mak­ing sure that you guys are demor­al­ized, depressed, and oppressed. 

    I am liv­ing in America, which has one of the worst human rights records in the 21st cen­tu­ry against African American and at no time the local, city, state, or fed­er­al gov­ern­ment has ever done any­thing to give crim­i­nals that com­fort­able and the law abid­ing cit­i­zens liv­ing in fear. 

    Well if Jamaica have any deriv­a­tives on the NYSE that you can bet about its future. I would be putting every­thing that I own against the island to fail and in the end I know that I am going to be rich. 

    Jamaica is not out of reach from ISIS, to come here and set­up shop. Because our politi­cians are some licky, licky peo­ple and once mon­ey is involved they are going to look the oth­er way,” said Mutabaruka.

    To the so called patri­ot­ic police offi­cers in Jamaica, the only future I can see for you guys are destruc­tion of peo­ple’s lives, career, and fam­i­ly. The best way to escape the drag­net, and sting oper­a­tions been set­up by the boasie slaves (PNP & JLP politi­cians) Is to migrate and left Jamaica for the elect­ed and unelect­ed polit­i­cal operatives. 

    Who have eyes to see, let them see; who have ears to hear, let them. Leave Jamaica so that the politi­cians and their crim­i­nal gangs con­trol the place because Jamaica is the Somalia of the Caribbean Sea.

  2. Chris , you notice that there will be no over­sight of the day to day oper­a­tions of indecom?
    So please read a peo­ple and their lead­ers with s**t for brains ‚.

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