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are over 150 gangs, anybody object to this request?
'Criminalise gang membership'
Police seek law to deal with group crimesROSS SHEIL, Online co-ordinator rsheil@jamaicaobserver.com
Friday, June 27, 2008
THE Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) wants the Government to introduce legislation criminalising gang membership.
Such legislation would enable police to pursue criminals based on their gang-related behaviour rather than specific offences and would increase the number of prosecutions, Owen Ellington, assistant commissioner of police with responsibility for operations, told the Observer during an interview.
According to Ellington, the move would be similar to the United States Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organisations (RICO) Act, which allows for criminals who have committed two gang-related crimes to be charged with racketeering. Since 1970, the RICO Act has been used by US law enforcement agencies to disrupt several prominent gangs, including the Italian mafia, and seize their assets.
"We need Rico-like statutes that deal more decisively with group crimes rather than individual offences," he said. "That kind of legislation, where we can criminalise criminal gangs and we can criminalise membership in a gang and therefore where any member of a gang is convicted of any offence we can spread the pain across all other known members of a gang."
The police say that there are more than 125 gangs in Jamaica, many of which include people who don't actually fire guns or engage in robberies and other crimes. These gang members, the police say, run errands like picking up money at remittance outlets to finance the gangs' operations; stakeout targets; carry guns for gunmen; and serve as lookouts to warn armed gangsters when members of the security forces enter their communities.
Ellington said that the current approach of the criminal justice system, which focuses on the individual, needs to be urgently updated.
"Urgent, because there has been a transformation of the Jamaican criminal landscape from individualistic one-to-one crimes to group offences or gang crimes which are responsible for over 80 per cent of our serious crimes - murders, shooting, extortion, contract killings, carjacking, the lotto scam out in St James and enforcing garrisons," Ellington told the Observer.
The JCF is building capacity in various areas so that once the legislation is passed, the Constabulary will be able to actively pursue the gangs, he added.
Police say they have already disrupted at least one gang using mathematical modelling techniques, which build profiles of gangs, including membership, activities, assets and local and international linkages. The officer who introduced that approach, Assistant Superintendent Kevin Blake, is also rolling out an islandwide intelligence database for the JCF via his company, Enterprise Technology International.
Currently operating at a divisional level, the database centrally records all information collected by police, much of which remains limited to paper-based records.
"As it is now, you lose a register, you lose everything," Ellington said.
Other information from the criminal justice system can also be stored into the database, including courts and prison records.
The JCF aims to roll out the system to every station. However, this will depend on the progress of upgrading, including the provision of computer equipment and Internet access.
'Criminalise gang membership'
Police seek law to deal with group crimesROSS SHEIL, Online co-ordinator rsheil@jamaicaobserver.com
Friday, June 27, 2008
THE Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) wants the Government to introduce legislation criminalising gang membership.
Such legislation would enable police to pursue criminals based on their gang-related behaviour rather than specific offences and would increase the number of prosecutions, Owen Ellington, assistant commissioner of police with responsibility for operations, told the Observer during an interview.
According to Ellington, the move would be similar to the United States Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organisations (RICO) Act, which allows for criminals who have committed two gang-related crimes to be charged with racketeering. Since 1970, the RICO Act has been used by US law enforcement agencies to disrupt several prominent gangs, including the Italian mafia, and seize their assets.
"We need Rico-like statutes that deal more decisively with group crimes rather than individual offences," he said. "That kind of legislation, where we can criminalise criminal gangs and we can criminalise membership in a gang and therefore where any member of a gang is convicted of any offence we can spread the pain across all other known members of a gang."
The police say that there are more than 125 gangs in Jamaica, many of which include people who don't actually fire guns or engage in robberies and other crimes. These gang members, the police say, run errands like picking up money at remittance outlets to finance the gangs' operations; stakeout targets; carry guns for gunmen; and serve as lookouts to warn armed gangsters when members of the security forces enter their communities.
Ellington said that the current approach of the criminal justice system, which focuses on the individual, needs to be urgently updated.
"Urgent, because there has been a transformation of the Jamaican criminal landscape from individualistic one-to-one crimes to group offences or gang crimes which are responsible for over 80 per cent of our serious crimes - murders, shooting, extortion, contract killings, carjacking, the lotto scam out in St James and enforcing garrisons," Ellington told the Observer.
The JCF is building capacity in various areas so that once the legislation is passed, the Constabulary will be able to actively pursue the gangs, he added.
Police say they have already disrupted at least one gang using mathematical modelling techniques, which build profiles of gangs, including membership, activities, assets and local and international linkages. The officer who introduced that approach, Assistant Superintendent Kevin Blake, is also rolling out an islandwide intelligence database for the JCF via his company, Enterprise Technology International.
Currently operating at a divisional level, the database centrally records all information collected by police, much of which remains limited to paper-based records.
"As it is now, you lose a register, you lose everything," Ellington said.
Other information from the criminal justice system can also be stored into the database, including courts and prison records.
The JCF aims to roll out the system to every station. However, this will depend on the progress of upgrading, including the provision of computer equipment and Internet access.
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