Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee has taken note of the long list of unsolved serious crimes including execution-type murders saying that it insinuates that the Guyana Police Force “lacks the ability or will to solve these high profile cases”.
Rohee’s statement comes at a time when there are more than a dozen unsolved executions and a series of gun crimes that continue to raise serious questions about the modus operandi of members of the force and the resources available to them to effectively solve crimes.
In his statement to the ranks attending the Police Officers Annual Conference last Thursday, the minister said, “I have noted, with dismay, the long list of unsolved serious crimes particularly execution-type murders that remain on the records of the Guyana Police Force.”
According to statement, a copy of which was dispatched to the media yesterday, he said, “The Ministry of Home Affairs is far from happy with this state of affairs. The force would have to review its current investigative capacity and take corrective action.”
According to Rohee, one such step recommended is the intensification of the training of detectives of the Guyana Police Force’s Criminal Investigations Department (CID), something which he said would have long-term benefits.
“Because of the immediacy of this problem, more dedication must be shown by the investigators of the force in bringing perpetrators to justice,” he said, while noting that the inability of the CID, which is the force’s investigative arm, to solve this large number of serious crimes is affecting public confidence in the force. “This negative trend must be reversed,” he stressed.
This is probably Rohee’s bluntest statement on the matter to the police during his tenure as Home Affairs Minister and it comes amid a raft of programmes announced to revamp the police force and its image. UK consultancy firm Capita Symonds has been retained for this.
On the long list of serious crimes are the three execution-style killings during the last quarter of 2010, which claimed a total of eight lives including a woman and her three-year-old son.
The first set of persons to die was Steve Jupiter called ‘Steve man’; his girlfriend Fiona Singh and their son, Neil Jupiter, three years old; Christopher Gordon and Sherwin Jerome called ‘Dice Head’. Unknown gunmen riddled their car with bullets as they were driving out of Cummings Lodge, East Coast Demerara on September 4.
Then several weeks later on October 1 Mark Caesar was the victim of a drive-by shooting as he stood alone at the corner of Broad and Adelaide streets in Charlestown. Jupiter’s brother Dexter Marshall, who was charged with Caesar’s murder, was freed after a High Court jury found him not guilty. Marshall and Caesar’s brother were said to be close friends.
Days later Patrick Goodluck and Godfrey Grootfaam were executed at Stone Avenue, Campbellville.
Police officials have maintained that the three killings were related. Crime Chief Seelall Persaud recently described it as an execution followed by “retaliation then a retaliation of that retaliation”.
Also on the least are last year’s hit on Ricardo Rodrigues and his bodyguard Marlon Osborne. Rodrigues was said to have been targeted following the discovery of a large cache of arms in Lethem.
The January 24 murder of city businessman Imtiaz Roopnarine also remains unsolved along with the killings of miners Dave Wills and Gavin Mc Neil, which occurred on January 31 and February 20 respectively.
The list also includes armed robberies committed on Chinese nationals and business persons. In some cases the victims were shot and wounded.
