Last Updated on Saturday, 26 December 2015, 21:01 by GxMedia
Police Commissioner Leroy Brummel on Wednesday told traffic cops that they must engage in “harassment” of offending road users to control the “terrible” situation that has claimed more lives.“When you enforce, you hear harassment. If that is the way for us to bring it well, we must do that but we are not calling it harassment. We are calling it firm investigation and interrogation,’ he said.
He suggested that traffic police ignore claims by some road users that they are being harassed. The Commissioner, however, did not address the issue of bribery or requests by police for inducement so that they could turn a blind eye to offences.
Addressing the annual awards ceremony at the Tactical Services Unit’s drill square, Brummell noted that there has been a 30 percent increase in the number of road deaths this year so far.
Latest statistics revealed by the Police Commissioner shows that 59 persons died in 56 fatal accidents for this year so far compared to 45 in 43 fatal accidents in 2012.
Touching on the recent spate of gun-related robberies, which peaked on Monday with at least four in one day- the Police Commissioner said that a number might have been in collusion with staff members. “Many of the robberies that you have, when you look, there is some inside collusion in it,” he said. Police have not reported any prosecution of staffers in recent robberies.
He urged business persons and residents to be conscious about their surroundings and take action to stem criminal activity. “We have to be security conscious in anything that we do,” he said.
Against the background of a call by the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry and A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) for police to do more to fight crime, the Police Commissioner shrugged off those wanted to dictate how the police should suppress crime.
“Everybody start saying what the force must do and what the force must not do. I want us to know that we are the number one agency as it relates to fighting crime in this country and we’ll fight it,” he said.