If The (indecom) Law Is Good Why Can’t My Critics Defend These Facts.…

Though not a lawyer, having read the INDECOM Act on its roll-out ‚I concluded that this law would (1) Increase crime.(2) Embolden criminals.
(3)Dramatically erode the morale of the men and women of the Police Department, among other things.
My opposition is a matter of public record.

Set aside my well know sense of revul­sion for the head of INDECOM, a right, and just piece of leg­is­la­tion, well thought out, and enact­ed, would have put cor­rupt cops on notice that betray­al of their sacred oaths would not be tol­er­at­ed. Additionally it would be a truth-sur­ro­gate for law­ful police actions.
I have spo­ken to many police offi­cers, past and present, hard­ly any­one with whom I have talked to has had any oppo­si­tion to oversight.
So the straw-man argu­ments that, (1) Police offi­cers want to oper­ate out­side the bounds of the laws, and, (2) That they are opposed to over­sight are sim­ply not correct.

At the time the law was enact­ed, then Prime Minister Bruce Golding had this to say.
“We will sup­port you, but we will hold you account­able,” about the Police Department.
I am not sure whether any Police offi­cer real­ized or ben­e­fit­ed from that sup­port Golding had offered before he was forced to step aside.
What I do know is that the entire Police Force, Military, and Corrections have been bit­ten by the lov­ing hands of Bruce Golding’s largess[sic]
Hundreds of peo­ple have died unnec­es­sar­i­ly as a result of this gift he so will­ing­ly forced on our country.
The crim­i­nal under­world could not ask for a bet­ter gift.

What we do know is that a bill was cob­bled togeth­er and passed which (1) vio­lates the con­sti­tu­tion­al rights of offi­cers by forc­ing them to prompt­ly give writ­ten affi­davits of their actions even after the most trau­mat­ic encounters.
Anyone con­ver­sant with most life and death sit­u­a­tions in which police law­ful­ly use lethal force, know that the offi­cer or offi­cers involved are gen­er­al­ly severe­ly traumatized.

I under­stand that all too well, hav­ing being shot at point blank range in the dark­ened zinc fenced alley known as Blackwood Terrace in the Kingston 8 area. When you are forced to use force to save your own life you need time to recoup your thoughts.
That is the rea­son Police depart­ments across the west­ern world do not force their offi­cers to give writ­ten affi­davits until they have had a chance to recov­er from the trau­ma of their ordeal, with­ing a rea­son­able time of course.

No one can be forced to give a writ­ten state­ment accord­ing to the Jamaican Constitution.
However, agents of the state were cor­rect­ly required to give writ­ten accounts of their actions with­ing a rea­son­able time, of course, this was before the INDECOM Act which Golding gave the nation and the Police.
Forcing them to give state­ments imme­di­ate­ly after fac­ing death up close is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. The Act was designed explic­it­ly to snare police offi­cers rather than arrive at the truth.

The entire­ty of the INDECOM Act is puni­tive and destruc­tive to law enforce­ment and the nation . Bruce Golding must have known that this was a bad law. He is not a lawyer but the then Prime Minister had at his dis­pos­al lawyers with­in his cab­i­net and a slew of oth­er attor­neys, includ­ing his then Attorney General and Justice Minister.
That a law was draft­ed which con­tained such destruc­tive ele­ments to law enforce­ment can­not be viewed as an error . It must be seen for what it is a cyn­i­cal, yet direct assault on law enforcement.

Forcing Law enforce­ment to give state­ments up front is only one of the many prob­lems which sup­port my con­tin­ued argu­ment that the law is bad.
Having cre­at­ed a firestorm of dis­sent with­ing the Constabulary, INDECOM was forced to acknowl­edge that there need be a mem­o­ran­dum of under­stand­ing between the two agen­cies. That alone is proof that the law is not only imper­fect it is fun­da­men­tal­ly flawed.
Using bul­ly tac­tics the head of INDECOM has picked fights with the Director of Public Prosecution, the JCF, the Military and Corrections Department.

Having acri­mo­nious rela­tion­ships with agen­cies INDECOM is tasked with inves­ti­gat­ing does not enhance the inves­tiga­tive capac­i­ty of INDECOM it com­pli­cates them.
No ill which may cred­i­bly be laid at the feet of INDECOM is more con­se­quen­tial than the chill­ing effect it has had on the abil­i­ty of police and the mil­i­tary to do their jobs with­out the very real specter of prison and finan­cial ruin hang­ing over them for well.….…. doing their jobs.
This had led to a dra­mat­ic rise in the num­ber of seri­ous crimes to include Murders, rapes, abduc­tions et al.
The evi­dence that crim­i­nals are more embold­ened is lost only on the con­ve­nient­ly blind.

Just recent­ly Minister of National Security Robert Montague told the police that as part of a part­ing gift to out­go­ing Commissioner Carl Williams the admin­is­tra­tion would be mov­ing to com­plete the MoU with INDECOM and the JCF and would have it signed expe­di­tious­ly in hon­or of Dr Carl Williams. That is my going away gift to him,” Montague told police offi­cers and oth­er guests at the JCF annu­al devo­tion exercise.

As I have con­sis­tent­ly said, no one denies them their over­sight, but it can­not be a type of super­vi­sion head­ed by their cronies, designed to put police offi­cers in jeop­ardy for doing their jobs.
Bruce Golding may have thought this a cru­el joke when he stuck the Jamaican peo­ple with it, but no one is laugh­ing now.
The eyes of the peo­ple final­ly see for them­selves the con­se­quences of this dan­ger­ous law.

To the cyn­ics and oth­ers unable to think for themselves.
Those who have crit­i­cized me for con­sis­tent­ly speak­ing to the flawed nature of the INDECOM Act, I say the following.
♦ If the law was per­fect why is a MoU required to bridge the gap between two Agencies?
♦Why are the con­sti­tu­tion­al rights of offi­cers vio­lat­ed in the giv­ing of sworn affi­davits when no oth­er Jamaicans are required to do so?
♦ If the law was per­fect and should remain ‚why are no oth­er police depart­ments in the west­ern world forced to give sworn state­ments even while they are trau­ma­tized, con­trary to their con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly guar­an­teed rights ?
♦Why will the Government now pay the legal cost police offi­cers incur in deal­ing with INDECOM?
♦Why would mem­bers of the Parliamentary select com­mit­tee hav­ing heard evi­dence from both sides, con­clud­ed that the issues inher­ent­ly wrong with the law prob­a­bly can­not be fixed by a MoU?

I wish I had a dol­lar for every per­son who has said to me ” I have read the INDECOM Act and noth­ing is wrong with it.”
Never mind those who have insist­ed that if offi­cers are fol­low­ing the laws they have noth­ing to fear.
Those are the talk­ing points of vil­lage lawyers and know-noth­ing trolls who speak or write because they can put a few words together.
Understanding fun­da­men­tal­ly the con­se­quen­tial adverse effects a law like the INDECOM Act can have on law enforce­ment requires law enforce­ment expe­ri­ence , law enforce­ment input, or a seri­ous desire to under­stand the minu­tia of the con­se­quences such a law can have.

There was no desire to co-opt the views of the law enforce­ment com­mu­ni­ty into the frame­work of the law. As a con­se­quence, the Golding Administration stuck it to the police with dev­as­tat­ing con­se­quences to the country.
The par­ti­san polit­i­cal shills will now do one of two things . They will either be death­ly silent or they will come gun­ning for me with their cat­tle-prods and pitch forks for dar­ing to crit­i­cize their polit­i­cal idols, and a law they do not understand, .
As one who is more close­ly aligned with Golding’s Party I do not care about crit­ics assail­ing me, they were wrong since my argu­ments start­ed after read­ing the law, so ful­ly and they are wrong now.
At the same time Jamaicans with whom I dis­agree polit­i­cal­ly, have come out against the law and have been exco­ri­at­ed for hav­ing the back­bone to do so. Damion Crawford comes to mind.

This mur­der­ous crime wave which has gripped the Island is not ordinary.
People who ordi­nar­i­ly nev­er would com­mit cer­tain crimes are now embold­ened to engage in crim­i­nal rape and mur­der of lit­tle girls in the most heinous demon­ic fashion.
They do in so indi­vid­u­al­ly like dan­ger­ous preda­tors and in packs, like beasts of prey they pounce on the weak and defense​less​.so ful­ly con­ver­sant that they will not be caught, and and worse will nev­er be prosecuted.
Marching and pray­ing can­not, and will not do a sin­gle thing to solve crime.

A total repeal of the INDECOM Act is a must.
The law must be redone with appro­pri­ate law enforce­ment input and the lev­el-head­ed approach nec­es­sary ‚so that cit­i­zens wronged have redress . It must how­ev­er have the nec­es­sary safe­guards and pro­tec­tions for our law enforce­ment offi­cers to do their jobs with­out being intim­i­dat­ed about the dis­tinct pos­si­bil­i­ty of impris­on­ment and finan­cial ruin , or both, for doing their jobs.

Clean up the cor­rupt Judiciary which is active­ly engaged in cor­rupt prac­tices . Judges are cor­rupt­ly return­ing dan­ger­ous crim­i­nals to the streets after they have killed mul­ti­ple times, and are arrested.

Pass truth in sen­tenc­ing laws which send mur­der­ers ‚rapists , and those who engage in oth­er dan­ger­ous crimes to prison for life.
Remove from the hands of the cor­rupt lib­er­al judges the abil­i­ty to decide the sen­tence in cas­es of mur­der , rape extor­tion and racketeering.
Encourage investors to come in and invest after remov­ing the ridicu­lous bureau­crat­ic imped­i­ments to eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment in the pri­vate sector.
Offer tax incen­tives to return­ing residents.
Hire new judges from the pros­e­cu­tion side ‚so that crim­i­nals will receive the memo that they will not be reward­ed for their lives of crime.

Anything out­side these actions are futile use­less pandering.