Worrying contradictions and decision-making

Jan 08, 2014 Editorial

This must be the most frustrating police force in the world, where an unarmed police rank attempts to capture an armed escapee. On one hand we are told that no less a figure than the deputy commissioner had been informed that it was friendly fire which killed Detective Corporal Silburn Elias. Then the police commissioner tells us that Elias was shot by the escaped prisoner who had disarmed the escorting rank and fled to Alberttown. Just who is to be believed?
Again we come full circle needing to know what level of training is provided to the sons and daughters of Guyanese citizens to prepare them for these situations. How on earth can an unarmed policeman with twenty-five years’ service and a father and husband be so reckless as to entertain the belief that he could physically subdue an armed felon?
Our sympathies go out to the relatives of this fallen rank, but from initial indications this was a totally unnecessary adventure if the second police explanation is accurate.
Recently we read of the spat between the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation officials and the Guyana Police Force on the question of prisoners taken for treatment at that institution. Leaving aside the merits and demerits of the respective arguments, it seems that nothing has been learned to cause any significant shifting of entrenched positions.
But more importantly is the need to get immediate answers to the following questions. By what means were the duo transported to the hospital? The escorting rank, according to the commissioner, was just out of recruit training. Why send a greenhorn to escort a prisoner who was considered dangerous enough to be escorted under arms? Was the rank sufficiently proficient in the handling, care and custody of firearms to be issued with a service revolver? Was there available backup at the hospital?
An eyewitness is reported to have seen the prisoner tear off the policeman’s shirt but probably in the heat of the moment, did not see him run out with the officer’s weapon. It would be a disservice to the slain man’s family’s expectations of justice if the first version, reportedly given by the Crime Chief, is more in keeping with the actual events.
The cynicism which currently prevails in reaction to police explanations are doing the police image immense harm. It bespeaks a troubling breakdown in the relations between the citizenry and the body established to stand as the bulwark against a total destruction of all that right-thinking persons hold dear.
It is nonsense to have a prisoner mingling with other patients and having to wait an inordinate length of time for treatment. We are not saying that prisoners must be treated in front of critical cases, but to expect that detainees who are being deprived of their freedom will meekly sit and wait to be taken to the lockups is really asking too much. Knowing what obtains at certain public institutions like the GPHC, a hardboiled prisoner will be planning and scheming from the moment of capture and will decamp at the earliest opportunity that is presented.
We can be thankful that the situation did not require SWAT intervention, in light of the fact that many persons would have been present awaiting medical attention. Imagine a hostage scenario with screaming, hysterical, helpless people and an armed but determined terminally ill prisoner. Definitely the stuff of nightmares for law enforcement and correctional agencies.
More serious thinking needs to be reflected in the way the police conduct business. It is not enough to give bland assurances that they are on top of things when the available evidence points to the contrary. The top brass in the GPF must be seen to have their act together when speaking on issues and not continue giving the perception of one person giving out half-baked information which is contradicted later in fundamental ways. Attitude transformation is the order of the day and must be demonstrated if the force is to move any distance along its reform trajectory.

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