Senior cop dismisses posturing of scamming bounty as reparation
Majority of J’cans spurn illicit practice, poll shows
Published:Saturday | August 20, 2022 | 12:08 AM
Dismissing the notion that the money fleeced from Americans by Jamaican scammers represents some form of reparation, a senior member of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) warned that proceeds from this illicit practice are used, among other things, to acquire illegal weapons to unleash violence on communities.
Head of the Counter-Terrorism and Organised Crime Investigation Branch (C-TOC), Assistant Commissioner of Police Anthony McLaughlin, welcomed the findings of an RJRGLEANER Group-commissioned poll that found that the majority of Jamaicans are opposed to lottery scamming.
Noting that he was pleased with the feedback from the Don Anderson poll, McLaughlin reminded those involved in lottery scamming that it is a crime and is also an extraditable offence.
He noted that many lottery scammers are also linked to other serious criminal activities.
“The police will definitely be stepping up their operations against these persons who continue to take part in lottery scamming,” he warned.
The senior cop said that the police have received a high level of cooperation from residents, adding that most of their operations to arrest those involved in lottery scamming were intelligence-driven.
“One of the things that the residents do find out is that once lottery scamming is taking place in their communities, when the spoils are not shared evenly, it results in murders and shootings,” he told The Gleaner.
Lifestyle of excess
McLaughlin observed that lottery scammers often parade and flaunt their ill-gotten gains publicly by purchasing high-end vehicles and constructing large houses. He said in many instances, the scammers did not have a job, yet their activities depicted a lifestyle of excess and heavy spending on a range of consumer items.
When Jamaicans were asked to give their views on lotto scamming, 58 per cent definitely opposed the activity, while 15 per cent neither supported nor disapproved of it.
While 18 per cent of respondents do not support lottery scamming, six per cent somewhat approve of it and another three per cent definitely give the illegal activity a thumbs up. Overall, nine per cent of all persons interviewed indicated support for lotto scamming.
Fieldwork for the study was done between July 16 and 26 at which time 1,113 Jamaicans were interviewed.
Anderson noted that females and older persons largely make up the demographic that is opposed to lottery scamming.
Persons in the younger age group and in the low- and middle-income brackets supported this form of crime.
The pollster identified St Catherine, St Elizabeth, St Mary and Hanover as the parishes where persons exhibited higher than normal levels of support for lotto scamming.
Anthropologist and lecturer at The University of the West Indies (UWI), Mona, Dr Herbert Gayle, opines that because of post-slavery trauma, “we do a lot of things that facilitate corruption in Jamaica”.
He argues that scamming makes perfect sense in Jamaica in an environment where people are always upset with the ‘big man’. He said that the United States is part of the system of the big man.
Gayle said that while Jamaicans have unsettled old colonial issues with the United Kingdom, the United States has not escaped the wrath of many who frown on that country’s big-stick policy.
“A lot of people think it’s just reparation and all the different loose terms, but when you speak to people, dem tell you, ‘Well, dem can afford it’,” he said.
He indicated that Jamaican scammers don’t see people in the US as being poor or significantly impacted by the funds they lose through the illicit activity.
Gayle acknowledged that Jamaicans love the United States and its culture, but at the same time, they are aware of that country’s economic and other forms of aggression. He stressed that people don’t feel that they are harming the US when they scam them.
“It’s not just flippant things like greed for money ... . Those might be primary because money is an important factor, but there is also what I call ‘a belly’ of knowing that you so big and mighty and me tek something off a you.”
He described it as post-colonial belly and nationalistic competition.
According to Gayle, the Jamaican middle class and middle age are more conservative and would not support lottery scamming while younger people and the poor might not have an issue with the practice.