Updated reflection on crime and my own crime plan

I've a friend who stands firm that the majority of murders and kidnappings are drug and gang related.

I've had discussions with my mom and my aunt about what is the real cause of the crime situation in the country, as well as what can be done to effectively combat it.

I've constantly read news reports, especially one two-page article from this past weekend's Guardian about gang-related violence and the police force having proper knowledge about the gangs, their members/(community) leaders and whereabouts.

I've read headlines that screamed at me: "KNOWN KIDNAPPER FOUND DEAD'

I've heard the rumours and the talks about known criminals being released and the forewarnings of a rise of crime in certain areas and activities related to these criminals. What a coincidence actually that the same day I was recently warned about a quite known criminal being released I also heard that a friend's drug-using/dealing neighbour was kidnapped.

and I know I'm not the only one. So what is really happening to this country?
*oh geeze, ANOTHER crime-related blog*
yea, sorry.. but it's constant material and needs to be dealt with.

I understand that in some cases police don't have concrete evidence to arrest these known kidnappers and criminals. I also understand that even if the police did have this evidence, the same police would tip off the criminals and they'd escape once again into the seemingly bottomless underworld of this country. In fact, I know someone who was kidnapped and tortured by members of a security firm/police force.

So let's see.. the government is corrupt, the police force is corrupt and citizens are seemingly blind. It seems the only people who are genuine are the bandits themselves. I can trust a criminal to rob me of my wallet, I can't trust a politician to intelligently and effectively operate their post. So on the one hand I have to be on guard for a man(and now women as well) with a knife or gun walking up to me and ALSO on guard for a politician walking up to me armed with a smile and a portfolio of promises. It's a pickle of a position to be in, especially when you can't count on nor trust the forces created to protect you against these things - the police force and integrity commission.

What then, can be a possible solution/s to these problems? We've heard the new crime plan that has turned out to be nothing more than recycled speeches and doomed-to-fail ideas.
Do you battle crime from a top-down approach (strengthening your police force) or a bottom-up approach (combating the source of crime - drugs/gangs/guns etc) or what I like to call the human factor - developing a proper social system, primarily targeting homes and schools.
Well apparently the top-down approach seems to be favoured by this government and we can see what a lovely job that's done so far. More cars! more police patrols!.. speaking of which, you know what's really funny? that you can read one newspaper and on one page read an article talking about crime plans and how we've gotten so many new vehicles for the police force in the past and then on the next page read a story about someone who was robbed and couldn't be attended to by police because they 'had no car'. Comedians couldn't write this stuff!

It is my opinion, like everything else in this blog (is), that the government has jerked us around for the past how-many-ever years with their crime plans. They can't be really taking this as seriously as they should. And if they are, with the full weight/gravity of the situation bearing on them while they create these crime plans, I have to seriously question the intelligence of our leaders. Crime in this country has gotten way past the point where anything contained in any crime plan I have read will be any sort of effective.


my CRIME PLAN:
A combination of strategies is the only solution I see that can be anywhere near likely to making a dent in crime. Strategies that I named before - top, middle, down. Total reformation of the police force. Background and in-depth in-house investigations. Do we have an equivalent to the U.S. Dept. of Internal Affairs? Not just an increase in police numbers, but in police technology. Americans are flame throwers to us, only just having discovered fire. You mean we can't even get a proper DNA forensic team together? For all the psychologists we have in this country you'd think SOMEONE would clue in our legal system that eyewitness testimony isn't exactly the most valid and precise way of obtaining evidence. I have heard of ONE case of police actually dusting for finger prints at a crime scene out of the many, many stories I've heard of crime scenes. But what good are fingerprints anyway if you don't catch the criminal? this brings us back to technology.. I find it extremely difficult to comprehend that we don't have a proper computerized criminal database in this country. Halo and CoD fanboys can whip up a 20 party LAN in a matter of minutes, play WOW with millions of other people and our police force still use pens and notepaper. It's abacus v. laptops man.
Increased numbers of police officers won't mean shit if they can't make. Psychological testing should be mandatory, not just as a requirement to become an officer but also during the course of an officer's career. Training should be modernized to incorporate updated procedures and exercises.

More on this in further posts.. moving on to bottom-up.

Drugs. Come on guys, Trinidad is NOT that big of a country. In fact, it's quite tiny. It's inconceivable that our police force has such a poor rate of successful drug raids and seizures. And hey! guess what's NOT a novel occurrence - kidnappings post drug shipment seizures and related incidents! as my friend says - they hadda get back their money somehow. A sociologist infiltrated quite a bit of the drug trade in this country years ago. It's not impossible to do again. Sometimes you have to let one big fish go to find lots of fish that will eventually lead you to bigger fish(plural of course). Infiltration of drug hierarchies for the purpose of information gathering would be done. Again more on this in later posts.

Middle - as stated before we need strategies to combat the escalating youth movement to a criminal lifestyle. The younger you get them is the more years we going to have of the problem. I heard schools used to have trips to prisons but they were stopped by the parents for being too 'coarse' or something like that.. raiiighht.

anyway dred, I hadda stop it here.. i'll continue later. It's 6.14 and I need sleep. Happy Birthday Nadya!!


to be cont'd...