The Police Commissioner’s failure in 2010 to submit his reports to the Police Com-plaints Authority (PCA) has resulted in 81 complaints being stalled according to the authority’s recently released annual report, which also highlighted indisciplined behaviour by some ranks.
The report, which was tabled during last week’s sitting of the National Assembly, said that for 2010, the authority received a total of 238 written complaints but of these only 115 reports were submitted by the Commis-sioner of Police. These matters have since been concluded, the report said, adding that 81 other matter were still pending, while the other 42 complaints were rejected.
According to the report, there were nine cases of alleged unlawful killings [committed by the police],” and the reports in respect of these matters were received by the police commissioner. The comments of PCA Chairman Cecil Kennard were later forwarded to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) as required by Section 15 of the PCA Act 1989. In one of the cases a charge of manslaughter was recommended, the report stated.
The report mentioned Kennard’s concern that in some cases the police have not been providing him with the information required. It was explained that under Sections 12-14 of the Act, “all statements, confessions, etc, taken during the course of an investigation should be submitted… in a timely manner whenever there is an allegation that a member of the Police Force had unlawfully killed someone or had caused serious injury to, or had discharged a loaded firearm, at another person”.
It was explained that this has to be done before the relevant file is submitted to the DPP Chambers for advice as the PCA chairman is required under Section 15 of the Act, to state to the DPP whether or not the investigations were satisfactorily conducted. It was further noted that under this section, the DPP is obligated to take the chairman’s comments into account when deciding whether or not criminal prosecutions must follow.
“In some cases the files were sent directly to the DPP instead of being sent to [the PCA] …in the first place. In some cases the files were not sent to the authority,” the report said.
Undesirable
attitude
Meanwhile, the report made mention of the attitude of “many members of the Special Constabulary”. They were said to be rude, reported for duty late, slept while on duty and improperly dressed.
The report stressed that from all appearances the defaulters are not being disciplined adding that this matter ought to be addressed urgently. Additionally, “The behaviour of some traffic ranks is also very disturbing as there have been numerous reports of corruption,” the report said.
Corruption has been a long standing concern for the Guyana Police Force. During the opening ceremony of the Annual Officers’ Conference last month, acting Police Commissioner Leroy Brummell and President Donald Ramotar both made mention of this issue in their addresses. They both agreed that weeding out the corrupt elements of the force continues to be on the front burner.
It was pointed out the police’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) continued to receive complaints and at present there are several ranks before the court on corruption-related charges.
The PCA report said the issue of corrupt traffic ranks needed to be addressed urgently as “this practice seems to be spreading”.
