Crime continues at Stabroek Square despite police presence

Oct 13, 2019 News

It is no secret that criminal elements continue to roam freely in and around the Stabroek, Georgetown area despite police presence.

Is police presence making a difference at Stabroek Market Square?

In a bid to stem the rapidly escalating incidents of crime at this location, police had resorted to relocating the mobile police outpost to a location just outside Stabroek Market, but even this seems to have little effect on the criminals that traverse the area every night.
One might wonder how effective is the police presence, especially since recently a man was able to chop off a handcuff at the outpost, kick down a plywood counter, and chase police officers with a cutlass, before escaping.
Former Crime Chief, Lyndon Alves, had indicated the intention of collaborating with the City Constabulary and other military bodies to make a sustained, combined approach to the issue, but after two months that seemingly have not materialised.
The ‘scam card operators’ continue to operate right under the noses of the police on the Demico Fast Food Outlet walkway, robbing innocent citizens of their hard earned dollars, and known criminals continue to congregate by night in their numbers, in the said location as well.
If one were to sit and observe, it will be quite disturbing to watch them size up their prey (innocent commuters) before moving in a well-organised network to pounce on individuals and rob them.
The male and female sex workers continue to gather by night outside the Parliament Building perimeter fence, where they work in harmony with known criminals to rob persons walking in that direction. In the most recent of incidents, security guard, Brian Welch, attempting to urinate in this area was relieved of a cellular phone, cash and other valuable, even before he had completed the process of urinating.
These workers and their accomplices have now turned their attention on Spanish-speaking prostitutes who are now working that area, robbing the ladies of valuables in the night.
Just recently, three businessmen jumped to the defence of three Spanish-speaking ladies of the night, as they were about to be robbed by a group of sex workers.
The girls were trailed to the Roof Garden of the Demico Outlet where the thieves lay in wait for them as they exited the venue a few hours later. The businessmen who were armed came to the rescue since the girls were in their company.
Here is yet another failed attempt by the Guyana Police Force to execute security for citizens as male ranks at the police outpost seem more interested in lazing around, and chatting with civilians, than on doing their jobs as expected.
Just recently, a female prostitute was observed beating a 14-year-old boy, and pelting him with beer bottles right under the nose of police officers who stood outside the outpost and failed to intervene. Fights are breaking out and the police are doing nothing, not to mention the fact that bicycle and motorcycle gangs are taking over the streets by nights, and passing just a few yards from the Stabroek Police Outpost, as officers stand by admiring them.
These individuals disrupt the regular flow of traffic, and have been known to rob persons as they ride through the city.
One might want to ask, where the nightly patrols that were picking up criminals in this area have gone, or if the officers that were assigned to patrol this area by night have disappeared into thin air.
And really what has happened to the plainclothes policemen who were used to nab criminals lurking at the bus parks?
It’s very difficult to pinpoint any of them these days, and citizens once again are left to the mercy of the criminals.
It’s even difficult these days to point out officers from the City Constabulary, working the area, since most of them are always hiding in the shades, or often busy, raking in goodies from vendors around the Stabroek Market.
Many thieves are now loudly mocking the police attempts at providing security in this area, laughingly mouthing, “Stricter the government, wiser is the population”.
Citizens are calling on the police to provide security and the sustained approached to eradiating crime as they have promised.