Can PJP Flush Out the Facilitators of Crime in St. Lucia

An Integrity Commission Report not long ago featured in the Saint Lucia Gazette, revealed that over thirty “persons in public life” had failed to file declarations of their income and expenditure as required by law. The list included a deputy House Speaker, two honorable members of Parliament and two senators. Also, six permanent and deputy secretaries, six heads of government departments, and sixteen heads of public institutions in which the state has a controlling interest. Additionally, the heads of three diplomatic missions. The list of law breakers had also been forwarded to the Director of Public Prosecution “for further action.” (To date, no public officer has been charged with contravening the Integrity in Public Life Act No 6 of 2004!)

In 1998, recently elected prime minister Kenny Anthony made the following appeal to the nation: “Fellow Saint Lucians, after the carnival season is over and the Lenten season begins, a Christian society is usually expected to begin a process of reflection and recommitment. Lent should be a period when we rededicate ourselves to finding the means by which to live more properly together, a time for strengthening our common bonds. But there are among us those who see the Lenten season as a time to kill, to terrorize our peace-loving community. This state of affairs began with the killing on March 4 of one Michael Alexander, also known as Gaboo. He was shot dead as he rode his bicycle along the Allan Bousquet Highway, in Balata. The killing was swift. It was professional. The killers were masked. They made good their escape through a banana field. The few eyewitnesses could only provide the police with information on the number of persons involved, but not detailed descriptions.” (There has never been an arrest in connection with the high-noon execution of Michael ‘Gaboo’ Alexander, generally considered a drug trafficker!)

The prime minister also referenced the July 1997 “cold-blooded assassination in broad daylight of Adolphus Clarke, aka Bonny.” One of the two suspects, the prime minister revealed, was wanted in connection with the fatal shooting of Eustace Phillip, also in 1997. “Notwithstanding the rumors of hit lists,” he went on, the police were slowly but surely closing in on the bold-faced assassins. He offered citizens his assurance that “those engaged in these dastardly acts are small in number and all of their actions are directed against one another.” Besides, the police had determined the several shootings between 1997 and March 1998 were all linked to a small group allegedly engaged in the illegal drug trade, that this was “not some widespread crime wave assaulting any and every person in the community.” It was, in essence, a struggle among rival gangs determined to wipe out each other, either as an act of revenge or in order to secure control of the illegal drug trade.

Then there was the incident on April 27, 1998 that had “startled the nation”: At the Vieux Fort Comprehensive Secondary School a student had “savagely attacked” the principal. It was a mark of Dr. Morella Joseph’s “deep Christian character that when she was visited at the hospital, even while she was visibly in pain, she expressed some concern about the future life chances of the student who had attacked her,” said Kenny Anthony. “We must emulate her courage and compassion.” (Less than three years later, by which time she was leader of the United Workers Party and campaigning for office, a front-line member of the Anthony’s St. Lucia Labour Party contradicted his leader’s expressed sentiments. Now he told participants at a rally that “Morella Joseph deserved what she got!” Yes, all of that in the presence of the prime minister, himself once a school principal!)

As if further to comfort the citizenry, Prime Minister Anthony blamed the cited murders and other crime on the police. They were weak, he said. They were indecisive and allegedly compromised. “While the drug barons grew bolder and richer, and the gangs grew larger, and their weaponry more sophisticated, the police force was allowed to wither. They were denied adequate numbers of vehicles. They were prevented from responding to calls from the public.” Starved of adequate manpower, the prime minister observed, “there was often no one to deal with crucial situations. The force grew dispirited, demoralized, ineffective.” Worse, it could not be denied that there was “an element of corruption within the police force . . . to the extent where prima facie evidence suggests police may be protecting certain drug concerns.” (Keep in mind, dear reader, the quoted words were spoken by the island’s prime minister in 1998!)

He echoed a phrase of which a Cabinet colleague was particularly fond: “Enough is enough!” After typically laying blame on the previous administration for the crime situation, it was now time to advertise his own remedy:   additional vehicles, twenty-four motorcycles with sophisticated communication systems, approximately fifty recruits, desk-bound senior police officers reassigned to crime-fighting. Additionally, the prime minister promised a review of the bail act in order to make life more difficult for those found in possession of illegal guns. Meanwhile, he had directed his attorney general to speed up the prosecution of gun-related offences. Finally, he appealed to regular citizens to monitor their communities and become paid police informants. A “significant reward” was under consideration.  

It turned out that all of the above was merely an amuse-bouche. The main course: “Government has resolved, following discussions between the relevant ministers and the police leadership, to take the fight to the gangs bent on disrupting our daily lives with their shootings. Commencing today, and continuing until it has obtained its operational operatives, the police will undertake a firm and sustained operation to secure our streets and rid our communities of this distasteful behavior. The actions to be taken by the police will be numerous, varied and the operation will take place at different levels throughout the country. Operation Restore Peace will use all lawful means to bring an end to the type of criminal activity we witnessed last week. The criminals may have started the battle but I assure you, law and order will end the war!”

For those who may have been curious about the effectiveness of Operation Restore Peace, Professor Ramesh Deosaran offered food for thought. At the January 2003 launching of a National Crime Commission, this is what he said: “When it comes to dealing with crime and its implications—especially the fear of crime in a country as small and as vulnerable as Saint Lucia—it cannot be business as usual.” He observed that there were no measures by which to determine the effectiveness of crime fighters. Despite that the police were better than ever equipped, despite their greater manpower and financial support, not only was the rate of crime constant but it was also increasing. “Not being a Saint Lucian,” said Deosaran pointedly, “I can speak boldly. I can risk saying without fear of political consequences, that it is high time taxpayers asked of their government: Are we getting our money’s worth?” (No one questioned the professor’s calculated insinuation that in Saint Lucia speaking out was risky business!)

Deosaran: “The police should have to explain why the detection rate is not as it should be. Why has a survey told us that 70 percent of the Saint Lucia population is dissatisfied with the performance of the police? I was amazed to learn from our survey that 99 percent of Saint Lucians consider crime a very serious problem. You have a unanimous verdict. If you, government agencies and citizens, continue to ignore it, then it will be at your own peril.”

At the remembered launching of the crime commission, Prime Minister Kenny Anthony chose to consider police matters outside his territory. “When the rate of serious crime was significantly reduced in New York,” he said, “one of the major reasons was the demand of accountability by Police Chief William Brackman from his several commanders in the various New York Districts.” He cited “certain allegations” that, if true, “confirm the public view that there is widespread corruption in the police force.”

(It would not be the last time Prime Minister Kenny Anthony suggested the men and women sworn to protect Saint Lucians lacked integrity, that they were themselves aiders and abettors of crime.  As for his reference to crime in New York, the “significant reduction” had resulted from an investment of millions of dollars, a battalion of new police officers, as well as several expensive social programs. Mayor Giuliani had also demonstrated a zero-tolerance attitude toward crime, outside and within his police precincts!)

In his 2004 New Year address to the nation the prime minister stuck to his off-shore theme. “We cannot ignore the fact that violent crime, drug trafficking and terrorism are creating havoc in countries and communities that once existed in peace and tranquility,” he insisted. “In Saint Lucia, the upsurge in violent crime is testimony to the fact that we are not removed from the whirlwind of negative change sweeping the world . . . Measures to combat crime must obviously go beyond ministerial adjustments. In the course of this year the government will recruit for training a further sixty police officers, twenty-eight of whom will replace officers who have retired or resigned. Of the thirty-two other officers, twenty-one will be specially trained for service in the Special Services Unit and assigned permanently to Vieux Fort this year to lend support to the regular police in the southern section of our island.” (Sounds familiar? Trust me, dear reader, there will be further repetitions!)

He took the opportunity to announce a Cabinet reshuffle that delivered to Senator Petrus Compton responsibility for the attorney general’s office “and the usual matters pertaining to the courts.” Compton would no longer be in charge of the police, that job having been transferred to the hands of the agriculture minister Calixte George, who would now head the Ministry of Home Affairs.

At a meeting of the National Commission on Crime in September 2005, Gus Small, the director of the Bordelais Correctional Facility, complained that 33 percent of his inmates were on custodial remand, impatiently awaiting their day in court. Their average age was between 16 and 22. They had been on remand at least 16 months.   “At the last Assizes,” Small told the gathering, “I stood up and asked Justice Redhead whether he thought it fair that we have five remand prisoners that have been waiting four years for a trial date.” He added that 49 criminally insane citizens were being housed at Bordelais. “Every month,” Small said, “we produce a discharge list for the police and other relevant authorities. We expect them to keep track of released inmates because we know that left unsupervised, they’ll soon be back at Bordelais. Many have suggested employment is the answer to recidivism.  But the young people tell me regular jobs don’t pay what they can make selling drugs . . .” (At time of writing, the number on custodial demand is 76 percent of the Bordelais’ inmates!)

Fast forward: Kenny Anthony is now Leader of the Opposition. On 25 May 2010 he convenes a press meeting to deliver an introductory statement on the current crime situation. He says: “The leadership of the St. Lucia Labour Party has listened to the cries of Saint Lucians from all walks of life. They want an end to the crime and lawlessness that have gripped our country over these last few weeks and months. We have heard the voices of the poor and dispossessed in the neighborhoods where indiscriminate gunshots have endangered and taken the lives of innocent bystanders. We have heard from shop owners and residents of affected communities who are now fearful of leaving their homes or even answering knocks at their doors.” (Yes, yes, reader, we’re revisiting life in Saint Lucia ten years ago!)

The business community, the social and religious groups, all had “expressed their fears and concerns” to the opposition party. Said its leader, members of the Stephenson King government, who should’ve been “devising plans to deal with the crime situation,” were themselves hardly model citizens. He cautioned Saint Lucians not to tolerate the government’s attempts at making scapegoats of the police when they themselves had failed to fully cooperate with foreign governments in addressing cross-border crime, “the illegal drug trade in particular.” (The same police he earlier considered corrupt!)

It was Stephenson King’s turn on March 30, 2010 to address the nation’s escalating crime problem. As had Kenny Anthony before him, King referred to challenges he said were “obviously beyond our control.” Especially disturbing, he moaned, was that “too many of us have lost all respect for human lives, including our own and our families’. Never before have we seen such violence, such anger and manifested self-hate. Could this be a fall-out from the so-called drug culture?”

Whatever was responsible, King promised, his government was determined “by whatever legal means at our disposal, to put an end to the atmosphere of fear now threatening parts of the country.” He regretted that certain elements within the society continued “to see in every murder recorded, every rape and burglary, every purse-snatching, another opportunity to gain cheap political mileage.” Not that his government had been idle: Since 2006, King reported, the allocation to the Home Affairs Ministry had been increased, police manpower had been bolstered by 58 and a further 60 recruits were soon to embark on a special training cycle. The police had received new equipment, additional vehicles and other facilities. Like his immediate predecessor, he acknowledged that while Saint Lucians did not expect miracles, they had “every justification for disappointment with local police performance.” On the other hand, “by their comments, their advertised refusal to cooperate with the government’s efforts against crime, they stoke the fires of rage that the authorities tell us is at the root of so much of the violence that threatens our very existence.”

King disclosed that at an emergency Cabinet meeting a number of decisions had been taken in relation to the escalating killing spree, among them the creation of a ministerial task force on crime and security, chaired by the prime minister. It would engage all social and economic partners “including political organizations.” Cabinet had “approved a patrol strategy prepared by the leadership of the island’s police to halt and eradicate creeping roadside blocks that facilitate criminal activity.” Said Prime Minister King, the police had the government’s permission “to destroy abandoned buildings that often serve as havens or points of assembly for launching criminal acts.” As for the justice system, the prime minister said it had to be “supportive of the efforts of law enforcement officers and apply the full punishment allowable under the law, especially in matters involving the use of firearms.”

On 28 November 2011, the people of Saint Lucia dumped the Stephenson King government and returned to office  Kenny Anthony’s Labour Party, following a successful campaign that centered on overwhelming murderous crime.On August 20, 2013 the new prime minister addressed the nation and the interested rest of the world via TV on what he referred to as “an unhappy episode.” He recalled that between 2010 and 2011, during the tenure of the King government, twelve individuals were shot and killed by the police “after the government launched what it named Operation Restore Confidence.” In a public address on February 13, 2011, Prime Minister King had warned local criminals “they would be hunted down, they would be found, prosecuted and made to pay the consequences for the crimes committed against our peace-loving, law-abiding people.” Anthony confirmed for his audience that while he still was in opposition, there had been in circulation “a hit list of targeted persons deemed to be criminals.” He said he had himself seen the death list.

Anthony officially stamped what already was common knowledge to most Saint Lucians: The State Department considered the earlier mentioned fatal shootings by police officers “potentially unlawful,” and had taken retaliatory action in accordance with the Leahy Law that prevented the United States from assisting any unit of the security forces of a foreign country if the Secretary of State has credible information that the unit has committed “a gross violation of human rights.” We need not go deeper into this particular “unhappy episode,” save to say Prime Minister Kenny Anthony had chosen to appease the U.S. by inviting a group of eight Jamaican police officers to investigate “the so-called extra-judicial killings” and that they had submitted a report, part of which the prime minister revealed during an address to the nation on the evening of 8 March 2015.

Especially shocking was the following (actually, “damning” was how the prime minister marked it): “All the shootings reviewed were fake encounters, staged by the police to legitimize their actions. Weapons supposedly found on the scene of alleged extra-judicial killings were from sources other than the victims. The weapons were planted. A number of shootings were done by police officers, listed as done by unknown assailants. The reports suggest the crime problem in Saint Lucia is facilitated by corrupt politicians, government officials, business persons and police officers.”

As discombobulating as was the report submitted by the investigators, it could hardly have been news to Kenny Anthony. Long before the Jamaican police were imported for special duty here, more than one local administration had been made aware of the key roles played by incumbent politicians, police officers and business people as the facilitators of crime in the region. At their 24th intersessional meeting in Haiti, two years before Kenny Anthony’s televised revelations, CARICOM heads were apprised of the deadly situation. The information was evidently treated by all parties as classified. There is no evidence a single CARICOM government took the professional recommendations seriously. Indeed, seven years after Kenny Anthony spoke of the facilitators of local crime there has been no related action.

It needs also be said that the Allen Chastanet government, elected in 2016 on its promise to attack the crime problem as Kenny Anthony never did, was at a loss at the end of its tenure to prove the administration had delivered—despite the appointment, at record cost to taxpayers, of a Director of Public Prosecution whose greatest achievement has been his ability to avoid all questions relating to crime in Saint Lucia, the unresolved extra-judicial police shootings especially. Shortly before the July 26, 2021 elections that returned Philip J. Pierre’s Labour Party to office, the DPP broke his perennial silence to say he planned to prosecute five police-officer suspects. (Eighteen months later, there has been no indication he intends to deliver on his pre-election promise, any more than he had delivered on his pledge at the time of his appointment in 2021.)

Meanwhile, there is this on the subject of crime amelioration from our current prime minister, who recently offered four-murders-a-week Saint Lucia what presumably he considered tangible proof of his government’s commitment to the eradication of crime. He said he had ordered new police vehicles, put in place several novel policies, enacted special legislation, set higher court fines, and appointed the island’s first ever female police commissioner. “We must fight the scourge of crime individually and collectively as a country,” he said. “To achieve this, we need you the citizens to promote a zero-tolerance attitude toward criminality in all its forms. Small infractions of the law, not speaking the truth, threats, malicious gossip, envy, peddling lies and hatred on the internet and airwaves, domestic violence and child abuse may appear small in comparison to homicides but we know how seemingly small issues snowball into larger social problems . . . The police must play their part in upholding and enforcing the rule of law. They must be examples of good governance in the conduct of their duties, obedient to their oath and have a zero tolerance for corruption among their ranks.” It is anyone’s guess how any of that will impact the commonplace fatal shootings, the robberies at gunpoint, the random deadly home invasions and daylight hold-ups.

The listed remedies certainly had not worked for his predecessors. Consider the following from a May 2021 address by Kenny Anthony: “I reflect that over the years we [successive governments] have done almost everything demanded of us with reference to crime, yet we have not been able to resolve it. What on earth is wrong? We bring initiatives, whether jointly or individually, yet we do not seem to have gotten the desired results. It means, therefore, we are not doing the right things. We need to be bold. We need to be dramatic. We need to be imaginative. We need to revisit all the approaches of the past and discard what has not worked. We have to find solutions.”

Prime Minister Pierre had barely ended his televised latest address on Sunday when gunmen started firing their automatic weapons at the dark Vieux Fort sky, apparently just for the hell of it. As I write (Friday) the latest crime report is that three young men from Dennery have been hospitalized following another shooting on Thursday evening, one in critical condition. Is it conceivable that when he sat down to write his reassurance speech to this crime-besieged nation resolution was the furthest thing from the mind of Philip J. Pierre?