CRIME STOP, the private sector initiative that brings the police and the public together in the fight against crime, is recording success with its one-year-old 'Get the Guns' campaign with over 50 firearms confiscated and over one million dollars paid out to confidants between last year and this past Sunday. This has added to hundreds of other illegal guns recovered by the police.
Crime Stop co-ordinator Prudence Gentles has credited the programme's success to increasing public willingness to give information, with as much as ten per cent of all guns recovered by the police comes through Crime Stop information.
The 'Get the Guns' campaign launched last February, encourages Jamaicans to "stop the killings" by helping the police get the guns by providing information of where they are. Through advertising campaigns locally and on the Internet, gun holders are also encouraged to turn in the weapons themselves. The rewards range from $20,000 to $100,000 with $100,000 offered for information leading to a conviction for a gun murder, $20,000 for handguns, $40,000 for semi-automatic weapons and $50,000 for high-powered weapons.
Mrs. Gentles said that between February and December of last year, $1.7 million was paid out and since the start of this year $210,000 has been given as reward money.
The programme's yield include shotguns, revolvers, semi automatic, submachines, home-made and high powered rifles. Forty-six firearms were recovered last year and six since the start of this year.
"Very few have been handed in but the initiative has been a huge success," Mrs. Gentles said. She said that the findings also led to one arrest that led to a charge for murder last year.
Like Crime Stop, information is confidential and there is no attempt to find out the identity of the caller. Payments can also be made confidentially and anonymously.
Crime Stop gets the information in a variety of ways, for example people might tell the police where to find guns or they describe people with guns and tell Crime Stop where to pick them up.
