A probe is to be launched into allegations by Montego Bay Mayor Glendon Harris that robot taxis owned by police personnel are promoting the rampant lawlessness downtown business district of the Second City.
Minister of National Security Peter Bunting said Police High Command would be mandated to probe the allegations.
“I will bring this allegation that you made… to the attention of both the Commissioner of Police and [Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency] West to investigate these vehicles that are supposed to be breaking the law and owned by policemen,” Bunting promised.
Harris made the allegations last week at a Montego Bay Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MBCCI) stakeholders meeting in Montego Bay.
Harris hit out against members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) who he accused of turning a blind eye to traffic violations, among myriad other offences committed in the city’s business centre.
“If you go to the intersection of Creek Street, St James Street, and this come in like a chorus now, you will find no less than 13 white plate cars… so I can say running ‘robot’, from there to Clock and Mount Salem and we can’t get the police to deal with them,” Harris said.
“My understanding is that these cars, by and large, are owned by police officers. It is said that they are owned by police officers. It needs the police to stamp on that once and for all,” he added.
Harris continued: “If people are allowed to do anything that they want to do, then that is why we end up with the murder rate as it is. You have to stop the small things. You are at a traffic light in Montego Bay; stop, and vehicle just pass you and the police are there, police vehicle is there and somebody just broke the stop light and gone and nothing is done.
“Enforcement must be the order of the day in order for us to get back some law and order and civility inside this city and inside this country.”
He was fully supported by Godfrey Dyer, the former president of the MBCCI.
“The people who you put there must serve. I have seen it also, things happening and a policeman walking by and he doesn’t see it. They are not performing. They need supervision. It doesn’t make sense you send half a dozen policeman down town and you don’t have supervisors checking on them to see what they are doing. They are just left there for the number of hours that they are left there. They are not performing they should be a lot more effective,” Dyer lamented.
He also questioned the effectiveness of the CCTV camera system installed in the area.
“I am very concerned about down town. There are many women who don’t want to walk down town. There is fear, robberies. I have seen no less than six people over the last two weeks who were robbed downtown. We have had a few murders down there too, and I wonder, now that we hear that we have cameras down there, what purpose does those cameras serve. What purpose are they serving there?” he asked.
But, the security minister, who attended the meeting, explained that the police do not usually speak of the help of cameras provide due to security reasons.
“Because we don’t speak to the assistance that the camera is giving, doesn’t mean it isn’t giving. We don’t necessarily want to give a heads up to people. Criminals may not know how you come to arrest them, how you got intelligence on this or that criminal activity, so we don’t necessarily want to highlight the work that the cameras are doing,” Bunting said. “If people become aware of it, what they do is just avoid the camera and what they do is just avoid the area. And instead of operating in the area that is covered by the camera, they go a couple street over and you end up don’t catching them. You just displace them.”
Meanwhile, President of the MCCI Gloria Henry said that “perhaps St James has a stronger appetite for criminal activity than anywhere else”.
She said: “Its a special case and therefore perhaps needs special attention. And we support some of the concerns that are being expressed that zero tolerance needs to be also on the part of the JCF that when a policeman stands somewhere and somebody is breaking the law and they don’t do anything about it, it sends the wrong signal to the persons looking on.
“The posture of criminals have changed, clearly. They are brazen they are committing their crime in clear view downtown Montego Bay. And so the policing strategy needs to also communicate a similar type of posture. A similar type of message that.”