Crime: Government being urged to be more prudent in policy, legislative responses

Jamaica's leaders are being urged to listen to voices of reason and legislate more effectively, as a response to the latest RJRGLEANER Don Anderson poll.

Civic and religious leaders, who spoke Monday on Radio Jamaica’s Beyond the Headlines, warned that the polls reflect growing frustration in the public, and caution that the security forces and political directorate have tremendous work to do for this to be changed.

The poll results showed that more than 90 per cent of Jamaicans say they have little or no confidence in the Jamaica Constabulary Force, JCF. It also follows the previous poll which showed almost no confidence in the leadership of the National Security Minister and Police Commissioner to curtail the country's crime wave.

Rev. Omar Morrison, Pastor of First Missionary Church and Member of the Downtown Kingston Ministers' Fraternal, expressed the view that there has been too much talking when the specific issues are known, and this contributes to the fall in confidence.

It was important, he said, to "take the profit out of crime" and "pursue justice without partiality," pointing to numerous examples of persons wanted for serious crimes not being arrested by the Jamaican police "until they are wanted by persons in the US or somewhere else."

Mickel Jacison, Executive Director of Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ), recommended that leaders use existing statutes to facilitate an overall reduction in violence.

That requires "moving beyond the continued public announcements and get the job done," she argued.

She believes there are specific laws and policies available which can be used cut the high levels of violence at the community level.

In that regard, she highlighted the Prime Minister's assertion of "the urgency to review the Child Care & Protection Act and the Domestic Violence Act," stressing that these are "things that civil society has been asking for for years, and Parliament collectively has sat down on the 2018 recommendation report."

These recommendations should be implemented promptly, "just as how we hear utterances of fast-tracking laws that will restrct citizens of their rights and freedoms," she urged.

In his comments on the dilemma, sociologist Horace Levy urged the nation’s leaders to focus on less brutal aspects of security management and continue the reform of the police force, while "building up the community out of extreme depravation which some of them suffer from."

There has been an almost exclusive reliance on force to combat crime, he said.

Mr Levy, drawing on decades of experience in social intervention, recalled that the recommendations pertaining to community transformation and reform of the police were made as far back as the early 1990s.

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