Knight
K.D. KNIGHT has been Minister of National Security and Justice for the past 12 years. He is recognised for making the most amendments to existing laws and introducing new ones. But he has also been lambasted for being the Security Minister under whose leadership there has been an unprecedented escalation of crime, charges of widespread human rights abuses by the Police Force, and a chronic feeling of insecurity among Jamaicans. He answered questions posed by The Sunday Gleaner's Klao Bell last week.
Question: You have been in office for 12 years, your plan was to overhaul the judiciary and upgrade the Police Force, how well has that been going?
Answer: Some gains have been made. When I came to office I was aware of the gulf between citizens and the police and disgruntlement in the Police Force. There were concerns about career opportunities.
I felt that they operated as a closed shop with cultural opposition to persons from outside coming on other than at the level of constable. There was an over-abundant emphasis on skills training rather than having an educated Police Force and therefore dealing with things in a wider context. My intent was to change that.
Q: How successful have you been, especially with police and citizens relations?
A: It is still not at an acceptable level, more so in the inner-city areas...Some progress has been made. Selling the idea to the Force was the most difficult aspect...that they must become integrated and a part of the structure of the communities.
Q: Why do you say it was most difficult?
A: Because they were coming from out of the suppression of crimes era where they received distress calls and then descended on the communities rather than being in there with the people. It had become the way of policing and therefore one had to break that approach.
Q: There is a socio-cultural barrier that challenges the idea of community policing, where the police display clear prejudice against people of lower income status, how are you going change that?
A: In 1984 when I was in Opposition, I presented a paper to my party and in it I was talking about the need for police to understand socio-economic issues, and to understand why a community will behave in a particular way - and therefore adjust their policing method to suit the kind of social behaviour that takes place in particular communities.
The police have to understand the social issues that face inner-city people, the economic conditions, the fact that these give rise to a resentment to authority and the police represent the first line of authority. And the fact that where there is a breakdown in the family structure it means that youngsters particular suffer.
Q: You understand that, but what evidence is there that the police do?
A: Well, this has been the challenge. How we have set about doing it is defining clearly what community policing is. It's not just having some policemen in an area.
We have changed the curriculum at the training schools to introduce topics like human relations and introduction to sociology, so that from that early stage they can begin to understand what they are going to be dealing with out there and how they can deal with it. And then we introduce junior and senior command courses so that those persons who are supervisors and managers can understand the concepts and what was to have been the way forward, the new thinking.
I think what has happened is, with the influx of cocaine into the society and the rise of the drug trade regionally and internationally, the violence that goes along with it has some effect on the programme. Inner-city youths are the most vulnerable and therefore they exhibit violent tendencies and the police in a sense retreat to their own way of dealing with violence.
Q: People hold you responsible for the crime problem and their feeling of insecurity, to what extent do you accept responsibility for that.
A: As long as one is a part of a Government one has to accept responsibility. But accepting responsibility in my view is not saying it is the sole responsibility. That would mean that one person or one Ministry can deal with a problem that is multifaceted and that is not so. It has to come within the framework of collective responsibility.
Q: Crime has affected foreign investments and tourism. Do you get flack from your colleagues in the Ministries responsible for investments and tourism?
A: No, it's a matter of the chicken and the egg, because there are those thinkers who say that when the economy is booming crime is likely to decrease, so is it that the economy must boom for there to be a lowering of crime, or is it that there has to be a decrease in crime in order for the economy to boom?
My own thinking is that there has to be the mix of strategies that will both encourage investments, local and foreign as well as making the society secure. It's not one before the other. It's not going to work that way. Both have to be plugging away at the same time. That's how it has to be or it won't work.
Q: The perception is that the man in the street still feels unsafe.
A:...I can't recall when it has ever been said that the economy has been booming or crime has been at a tolerable level. Right through the years these things have been issues. It's not unique to Jamaica, even when the American economy was booming crime was a major issue.
Q: To what extent are you inhibited or pressured by the Cabinet, in resolving the crime problem.
A: I, certainly, am not inhibited, I am assisted. For one thing, the Minister of Finance and Planning is acutely aware of the depth of the problem and so therefore within the available resources the Ministry (of National Security and Justice) is provided for.
Q: Is the budget enough?
A: No Ministry has enough, and Security and Justice is not an exception.
Q: Are you pleased with the performance of the Crime Management Unit?
A: It's early days yet, and one doesn't want to make any definite assessments, but my preliminary view is that it has the capacity to make the difference, particularly if it operates within the parameters of community policing and if it operates along the intelligence driven line.
But if it's simply going to be a unit that descends on communities then it is going to be totally alienated. Therefore, the objective I have is for it to be brain driven rather than brawn driven.
Q: But, this is not the perception that people have of the unit. You said that it should be able to move into any area it wants to.
A: We made it very clear that it has to be intelligence driven. Now intelligence in many situations is perishable. Now if it gets intelligence that some guns are at a particular location or some gunmen are at a particular location then it has to move. But that is clearly not saying that the people who are in the unit are not to be out there talking with persons and interacting with the community.
There is nothing impossible or difficult about that. What would be wrong is for it to be conducted like a body in barracks that responds only in emergency situations. That it is not!
Q: You said it's early days yet to make an assessment. At what stage would you think an assessment is appropriate?
A: A body like that you assess it over quarters, but one can't come to a position until after about a year, because of the fluctuating nature of the results. In one quarter, one may say its doing very well, in another it is not. Over a period of a year, one can begin to see how it is really operating.
Q: It has been in operation for at least three months, what did the quarterly review say?
A: It has had quite some achievement in that a number of persons have been arrested and charged, they found an appreciable amount of guns and ammunition, they also found some drugs and because of their operation they have been able to quieten down things in some areas.
But what one has to look at is the relationship with the people, the gathering of guns and associated ammunition and the ability to prevent certain high profile crimes like car jackings, and the ability to target dons and to have them properly arrested, properly charged and brought before the court by virtue of presentation of case, depth of investigations in having persons convicted.
Q: I don't know that they have had much success in the area of arresting dons.
A: Well that one takes time because you are breaking into organisations and therefore it takes time to get information, to build intelligence and to infiltrate.
Q: How do you feel about Reneto Adams as the leader of the Crime Management Unit (CMU).
A: I don't have any feeling about individual policemen. I look at the overall performance of the police and a division or a unit, because the unit or division is going to be as good as the members are...I'm not into the star thing.
Q: The members of the CMU, under the leadership of Mr. Adams, have killed people, young men, under what can be considered to be questionable circumstances. What do you say about these police killings?
A: I have had a very consistent position on that and it doesn't change. The law sets out very clearly, the circumstances under which a citizen can kill another or the police can kill a citizen and there is to be no deviation from that.
I have said that if persons act in such a way that the policeman's life is in danger, or that the policeman is about to lose his life, then the law allows him to use force that is necessary to repel the attack. It is no less for him, than for the citizen.
Q: There have been circumstances which I am sure you've seen and wondered about for yourself, to what extent is this one person's action a legitimate threat to the life of the police?
A: Which one person? If you are going to go to a specific person or if you are going to speak generally, then, I would want to answer accordingly.
Q: There is a fellow who was killed on Mountain View. He was wanted, they say, but he was not armed at the time say the people in the community. He ran and was shot down by the police.
A: If an unarmed person is shot down by the police then that is a criminal act and the criminal law deals with that.
Q: And what if the person is in fact armed and is out-numbered by the police?
A: Different circumstances apply, different considerations apply. What is he armed with? An M-16? What is he doing with the M-16? Is he firing it? Where are the policemen, in the open? Is there space for cover? It all depends upon the particular circumstance and that is why I don't like to come to conclusions based on what is said by one side or even sometimes both sides, especially where the stories differ.
What then is there to deal with that? When I took office one of the serious problems was the killing of citizens by the police. An average of 253 killings per year with a high of 356 in one year. That average is now somewhere around 145, never ever, on any occasion exceeding 200. Am I comfortable with that? That's the first thing. No, I am not!
Apart from expressing discomfiture, what have we done? Number one, the policy was developed with ISITAP, (International Criminal Investi-gations Training Assistance Programme) following United Nations standards relating to the use of force by police officers. That was put in the force orders and persons were given training concerning that. The second thing is, the then Prime Minister, (Michael Manley), the present Prime Minister and myself have been consistent in telling the police officers how we feel about the use of force, it must be in accordance with the law.
Thirdly, an Office of Professional Responsibility was established with an internal division, to investigate cases where there was the allegation that police have used excessive force or otherwise abusive behaviour.
Fourthly, there was general complaint that the police cannot investigate the police. Even though there was tremendous opposition from within the force a body was established by statute, that legislated the Police Public Complaints Authority as an independent body to investigate matters of that kind, headed by a retired judge of the Court of Appeal.
Q: Are you pleased with (Police) Commissioner (Fran-cis) Forbes.
A: Commissioner Forbes, as the head of the Jamaica Constabulary Force, understands very clearly the mission of the Force, the kind of leadership the Force needs and has been doing everything within his command to achieve the objectives. That's the kind of commissioner I like, and that's the kind of commissioner that pleases me.
Q: Is that any different from other commissioners?
A: I am not comparing, just talking about what exists.
Q: To what extent are you aware of corruption within the Police Force? It has been said that you are aware of it but are either hesitant or incapable of dealing with it.
A: I don't know what incapable means in the circumstance and I don't know what is your evidence of hesitant. But in terms of hesitance, the Bill to deal with corruption prevention has been put forward by the Government, emanating from this Ministry. That law covers the public service, which includes the police.
What I've heard is talk of its harshness. A part of the mandate of the Internal Affairs Division, the Bureau of Special Investigation, the Public Complaints Authority is to deal with police corruption. I don't know how an argument could be sustained about hesitance. There is the allegation of corruption in high places. That's being investigated, and the person who oversees this investigation is the Director of Public Prosecutions.
In so far as incapable is concerned - if it means that I am not able to personally weed out the corrupt then it is correct, because there is no authority vested in the Minister to investigate and take action. There is no authority vested in the Minister to dismiss a policeman at any level. But if it is an argument that says inability to develop the policies to deal with it, then that is not sustainable.
Q: Do you think that the perception that you and your Ministry are failing at dealing with crime, could cost the PNP in the next election?
A: I set about doing a job to put the policies in place to be able to deal with crime situations...A Government must do what it has to do and what it thinks is right and thereafter leave the judgement at the appropriate time to the electorate. I don't come to office thinking: "If I do this will the PNP win". I come to office thinking: "If I do this will it make Jamaica a safer place, will it enhance justice in the country". If I think it will, I do.
Q: We still have a lot of guns coming into the country, what's being done?
A: Number one, I have said that intelligence is the key to that kind of control. Therefore, what is established is a National Firearm and Gun Intelligence Centre, an intelligence body with the focus on the twin evils of guns and drugs.
Secondly, at the operational level there was the acquisition of x-ray units. Thirdly, there was the search for help from the principal source country, the United States of America. Fourthly, there was the acquisition of metal detectors. There was the acquisition and training of dogs to sniff for weapons. Then there was the equipping of helicopters with state of the art equipment to assist in surveillance. The training of persons in search techniques. These are all steps which are emanating from the Ministry of National Security and Justice. There is also the computer centre to assist in tracking criminals involved in lethal drugs. Then there was the acquisition of a piece of equipment for $11 million.
Q: Sir, the guns are still coming in.
A: In the United States, drugs are still going in. In the United Kingdom, guns still going in. What one has to look at is this. After those steps have been taken, is there the responsibility anywhere else - I dare say yes, I ask where? It must now be in the community because that's where the guns are being stored and used. There must be a responsibility, because in every country in the world, contraband gets through anyway, so some will still get through.
Q: Based on what has been found, is there any indication that the measures put in place have worked?
A: The (police) commissioner has said that the results coming from use of the equipment drug file tend to show that the same gun is being used in different crimes in many areas, I don't want to draw any conclusion. But what is happening too is that there is a romantic relationship with the gun.
Young men like to have a gun close to them, as a part of their apparel. I once said in an inner-city community: "When persons leave those communities and go abroad, they send back a gun for their friends." I said: "Don't ask for a gun, ask for a book or a computer."
Q: What has been the greatest challenge during your tenure?
A: The greatest challenge has been to reduce murder.
