Ignore The Little Things .…modus Operandi Of Jamaican Police

There is an old Jamaican adage which says *noth­ing ille­gal thrives unless Politicians and Police are involved in it*.
I don’t think that any ratio­nal per­son would argue with the bot­tom line truth­ful­ness of that statement.
Whether it is the erec­tion of shan­ty com­mu­ni­ties, the mass expan­sion of robot taxis, lot­to-scam­ming or what­ev­er, politi­cians and police have, through com­mis­sion or omis­sion, either active­ly par­tic­i­pat­ed or allowed these things to happen.
Over the years I have writ­ten exten­sive­ly that the Police could have done a far bet­ter job if its lead­er­ship under­stood the con­se­quences turn­ing a blind eye and or not stay­ing focused on a task has for the break­down of the rule of law.
I have used every lit­er­ary tool I have, to explain that a man sell­ing weed on the cor­ner can be an asset if cul­ti­vat­ed prop­er­ly, but the begin­ning of a seri­ous prob­lem if left alone.

That man must be used as a law enforce­ment tool to ensure that what­ev­er more seri­ous crimes are com­mit­ted in that area he feeds infor­ma­tion to trust­ed law-enforce­ment about them. No oth­er should be allowed to sell weed there.
Left alone, not used as an asset, soon more arrive, then it’s more dan­ger­ous drugs, guns, rob­beries, shoot­ings and before you know it that neigh­bor­hood is a slum from vio­lence, drug deal­ing, and drug abuse.
Property val­ue hits the dirt and fam­i­lies are cap­tives in their own homes and in the larg­er community.
Had the police moved, or ful­ly con­trolled that first guy sell­ing stick­weed all of the fore­gone would have been avert­ed. Isn’t that what has hap­pened across the entire coun­try though?

Thousands of cops and an arguably com­pelling need for thou­sands more, yet the crime sit­u­a­tion con­tin­ue to dete­ri­o­rate, but for the sit­u­a­tions in which emer­gency procla­ma­tions has been insti­tut­ed result­ing in large amounts of police and sol­diers to be con­cen­trat­ed in small geo­graph­i­cal areas.
Thus far, for the month of September, there has been an uptick in mur­ders to 4 per­sons killed per day from just over three per day. Some argue that we can­not lay these mur­ders at the feet of the police, they say politi­cians can­not be blamed for what peo­ple do.

If we do not blame the peo­ple who make the laws and those who enforce them, who are we to blame?
If the Police lead­er­ship used what­ev­er assets it has to micro-tar­get vio­lence pro­duc­ers and remove them from the equa­tion in what direc­tion do you think the mur­der num­bers would trend?
If the politi­cians cre­at­ed tough laws which send the right mes­sage, that crime will not be tol­er­at­ed and stayed out of the way of law enforce­ment, would we have more crime or less?

None of these point­ers mean any­thing, how­ev­er, because the Jamaican police con­tin­ue to act out­side its role by mak­ing judg­ment calls on what laws it enforces or whether it even both­ers to enforce them at all.
It is not up to police to make pol­i­cy, their job is to exe­cute what­ev­er pol­i­cy has been put in place by the civil­ian lead­er­ship. The police have no right to sup­plant enforc­ing the laws with their own bias­es. Contrary to what some will argue about *dis­cre­tion*, the police have no dis­cre­tion to allow the laws to be bro­ken, because they feel they are doing some greater good by allow­ing said breach­es of the law.

FROM JAMAICA OBSERVER

Deputy Superintendent Errol Adams

The police say, for now, they will not be pur­su­ing motor­cy­clists who have been using their bikes as taxis to cap­i­tal­ize on the night­mar­ish traf­fic con­ges­tion in sec­tions of the Corporate Area.

The traf­fic jams have been caused by the clo­sure of Portia Simpson Miller Square, for­mer­ly Three Miles, due to an ongo­ing road improve­ment project. The clo­sure is expect­ed to last for eight months. Head of the Public Safety Division of the new­ly estab­lished Public Safety and Traffic Enforcement Branch, Deputy Superintendent Errol Adams, told the Jamaica Observer yes­ter­day that the police’s focus, at this time, is ensur­ing that com­muters get to their des­ti­na­tions in a time­ly manner.

He was respond­ing to yes­ter­day’s front-page sto­ry, which report­ed that some bik­ers have been offer­ing a shut­tle ser­vice from Molynes Road to Half-Way-Tree in St Andrew, at a cost of $150. The cost of the ride could be more, depend­ing on the des­ti­na­tion of the com­muter. “We are ignor­ing them for now,” Deputy Superintendent Adams told the Observer at the inter­sec­tion of Hagley Park and Waltham Park roads yes­ter­day. The DSP, who was seen observ­ing the traf­fic flow, insist­ed that the greater issue is to alle­vi­ate the frus­tra­tion and anx­i­ety being expe­ri­enced by commuters.