March 1, 2001
JAMAICANS UNITED AGAINST POLICE BRUTALITY Letter From Delroy Chuck, Jamaica Labour Party member of Parliament Lloyd, I think this letter on tourism and tourism harassment is ill-conceived and stupid. Harassment is a real problem. Believe me we need the tourists to enjoy our lovely island and harassment keeps them away. If we had no tourists, what alternative activity or commodity would provide the foreign exchange. Until you can answer that do not chase away the tourists. At the same time, I do agree that our Jamaica people should be treated with respect and dignity, and there is simply no room for police brutality and abuse. Delroy Chuck
JUAPB RESPONSE TO DELROY CHUCK Dear Friends, Mr. Chuck's letter sounds like a man who got stung by a bee, and not being fast enough to swat the creature, he bawls out a few expletives that as a good gentleman he normally wouldn't use. In the meantime the bee has gone its merry way oblivious to the man's cursing and his pain. So there is no need to take seriously the epithets of "ill-conceived" and "stupid" which Mr. Chuck hurls in our direction. You resort to those kind of tactics when you get stung by facts for which you have no argument. Otherwise Mr. Chuck would have been able to demonstrate what is stupid about a reference to the disproportionate resources and power of our tourism moguls and their ability to force the hand of government in setting up a tourist resort police force which harasses Jamaican citizens going about their lawful business. It is common knowledge that tourism mogul Butch Stewart has on many occasions called for the use of foreign police (he sometimes mentions Israelis) as what is needed to solve our crime problem. He has threatened to take his money out of the country unless government brings crime under control. What he has not done, however, is to offer a contribution to the modest J$10 billion inner city rehabilitation fund called for by the Public Defender, Howard Hamilton, as one way of acknowledging the connection between poverty and crime. We are left instead with the continued reliance on police paramilitary tactics which the government hopes will pacify the likes of Butch Stewart. If it is legitimate for Butch Stewart to threaten to take his money out of the country if the government doesn't accede to his demands for a military style solution to crime (Mr. Chuck who is a newspaper columnist has never accused Stewart of being stupid for making this threat ), why is it "stupid" and "ill-conceived" to raise the question of a possible boycott of tourism as a means of forcing the government's hand on the question of police brutality? Why is it legitimate for the rich to exercise their power tp pressure government but not so for the poor? Mr. Chuck is on record as acknowledging the reality of Jamaican police brutality and the fact that police kill with impunity. How then does Mr. Chuck propose to deal with this cancer eating away at the society? The Government (without distinction to past and present governments) has been totally indifferent to the protests of the Jamaican people or to rebuke by international human rights organizations. Not even the annual reports by the US State Department commenting on police extrajudicial killings have made any impression. (See below for excepts from the latest State Department report). Why? Because there is no threat of sanctions. The only feeble threat came from a brief British ban on weapons to the Jamaica Constablulary Force but soon lifted for obvious reasons of opportunisn on the part of the British. Perhaps a quid pro quo inducement to the Jamaican government to help interdict drugs going to Britain through Jamaica. Mr. Chuck, as member of parliament, has yet to be heard inside that hallowed institution challenging either the ruling People's National Party (PNP) government or his own party, the Jamaica Labour Party, about their reliance on brutal police methods. Recently, in an otherwise sensible article, Mr. Chuck stupidly said that he admires the notorious Senior Superintendent Reneto Adams. This is the same senior police officer who hardly a day passes without some community or the other accusing him of abusing them or committing murder. Perhaps Mr. Chuck is alarmed that we have raised the question as to whether there should be a call for an international boycott of tourism because as a privileged member of society he doesn't understand what it is like to live under police siege and to have rights which the police are not bound to respect.There is no urgency in matter for him. He somehow believes that it is more important for the Stewarts and the Issas to make their millions than for poor people to live without fear of the police. Or, perhaps he believes that it is impossible to have a tourist industry that is both equitable and in harmony with human dignity. Because we believe that it is both possible and a necessity doesn't make us stupid. Whatever Mr. Chuck's ideological idiosyncracies the fact is that the rampant level of police brutality and lack of respect for basic human rights raises questions about the legitimacy of the Jamaican state. History teaches that in circumstances where the state has become unduly oppressive extreme remedies are legitimate and even necessary. The idea of an international boycott of Jamaica as a tourist destination as was effectively used in the struggle against the South African apartheid regime is perhaps one of the least painful ways of bringing about a change in the operations of the security forces. If not sanctions, what then do we do to end this intolerable and sustained level of police killings? Perhaps, instead of calling us stupid, Mr. Chuck might enlighten us with some of his more advanced thinking. Lloyd D'Aguilar
HIGHLIGHTS OF US STATE DEPARTMENT REPORT ON THE STATE OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN JAMAICA (1) The judiciary is independent but lacks adequate resources. (2) The Ministry of National Security and Justice oversees the JCF and the JDF. Civilian authorities generally maintain effective control of the security forces; however, some members of the security forces committed human rights abuses. (3) in 1999 annual per capita income was $2,531, but there is a large gap between the wealthy and the impoverished. (4) Members of the security forces committed extrajudicial killings and beatings and carried out Arbitrary arrests and detentions. (5) Although the Government moved to punish many of those police involved, continued impunity for police who commit abuses remains a problem. Police investigations often were hampered by lack of witnesses, and bottlenecks in the judicial systems cause long delays in resolution of criminal cases. (6) The police frequently employed lethal force in apprehending criminal suspects.[THE POLICE ALWAYS CLAIM THAT THOSE THEY KILLED WERE CRIMINAL SUSPECTS BUT MANY KILLED HAD NO HISTORY OF INVOLVEMENT IN CRIME. NOR IS IT LEGAL TO KILL SOMEONE BECAUSE HE IS A SUSPECT. JUAPB] During the year, there were 140 deaths, including those of 11 police officers, during police encounters with criminals. [OF THOSE 11 MANY WERE KILLED BY THEIR FELLOW POLICE OFFICERS FOR ONE REASON OR ANOTHER] While allegations of "police murder" were frequent, the validity of many of the allegations was suspect. [WHERE IS THE EVIDENCE FOR THIS?] (7) In February police killed a 20-year-old man in Farm district, Clarendon parish. The police claimed that they encountered a group of men, were fired upon, and returned fire. At that point, the man was hit. However, residents said that the police came upon the group, began firing indiscriminately and hit the victim. (8) On April 25, television stations broadcast news footage taken by an independent cable operator that showed a group of armed police officers surrounding a house in pursuit of an alleged gang leader, who was shot and killed by a police superintendent a few moments later [SENIOR SUPERINTENDENT RENETO ADAMS?]. The videotape did not show the shooting; however, the footage of a woman crying for help and a violent scuffle in a doorway stirred much controversy and led to a confrontation on April 27 between heavily armed gunmen and the police in a volatile area of Kingston. (9) In a press conference immediately after the outbreak of violence, security force leaders criticized Jamaicans for Justice, a nongovernmental organization (NGO) advocating human rights, for politically motivated involvement in the controversy (see Section 4). (10)During the press conference, the Police Commissioner also criticized a journalist for questioning possible political motivation behind the violent events (see Section 2.a.). (11) The authorities also brought murder charges against a police officer for the death of a taxi driver killed when police fired on a taxi carrying passengers in Kitson town in June 1999. The case was still in preliminary hearings at year's end. (12) On August 21, 1999, nine soldiers and four policemen severely beat Michael Gayle, described as a paranoid schizophrenic, after he tried to pass through a roadblock near his home after curfew. Gayle died as the result of a ruptured abdomen; at the coroner's inquest, the jury returned a majority verdict that all police and military personnel on duty at the roadblock at that time should be charged with manslaughter. However, in March the Director of Public Prosecutions ruled that there was not sufficient evidence to bring charges against specific individuals for Gayle's death. I13) In June police fired on a minibus carrying 16 passengers when the driver failed to stop at a roadblock. The police reported that they had received reports of gunmen on the bus. After the bus sped away, the police pursued and fired on it. One passenger took off his white shirt and waved it out a window, shouting that passengers were on the bus, but had to duck back inside when the police continued shooting. Six persons were injured, including two students. (14) A Human Rights Watch (HRW) report published in July 1999 detailed frequent and credible allegations of police abuse, specifically in lockups, including severe beatings, mock executions, and rape. (15) HRW noted that the Government must undertake a systematic effort to curb police abuse effectively and bring sanctions against officers who commit abuses. (16) The Jamaica Constabulary Force Act permits the arrest of persons "reasonably suspected" of having committed a crime, and the police continued to arrest and detain citizens arbitrarily. In 1997 the Jamaican Bar Association (JBA) protested that the police unlawfully were detaining and fingerprinting groups of citizens in poor, inner-city areas. (17) Although it was believed widely that the police were involved and acted at the behest of Montego Bay merchants and with the acquiescence of the local government [AND NATIONAL GOVERNMENT LEADERS], the commission exonerated the Montego Bay mayor and parish council. The commission named the police inspector and civil service truck driver as key conspirators and criticized the local head of public works for instituting a coverup. The two public sector employees were awaiting trial at year's end. (18) The law requires police to present a detainee in court within 48 hours of arrest, but the authorities continued to detain suspects, especially those from poor neighborhoods, without bringing them before a judge within the prescribed period. (19) The Constitution prohibits arbitrary intrusion by the State into the private life of an individual; however, there were allegations of unauthorized wiretapping by the police. The revised Jamaica Constabulary Force Act gives security personnel broad powers of search and seizure similar to those granted by the former Suppression of Crimes Act. The act allows search of a person on board or disembarking a ship or boat without a warrant if a police officer has good reason to be suspicious. In practice the police conducted searches without warrants. (20) In an April 27 press conference, the Police Commissioner criticized a journalist who raised a question about political motivation behind a violent confrontation that occurred the previous day (see Section 1.a.). On the following day, the same journalist was confronted by a police officer who pointed his gun inside the journalist's vehicle and asked him what he was doing. (21) There were numerous community protests against police actions during the year, such as the 2 days of protests in May Pen over a killing by police (see Section 1.a.). A local human rights group organized various rallies, including reenactments of the August 1999 beating of a man by security forces (see Section 1.a.) and the July 1999 abduction of homeless persons (see Section 1.c.). Click here to return to Jamaicans United Against Police Brutality homepage. |