Garwin Davis, Staff Reporter
WESTERN BUREAU -
TOURISTS who have been victims of crimes are often reluctant to return to Jamaica to testify against their assailants, sometimes allowing the guilty to go free, local authorities reveal.
"If the offence is very serious we try and make all the necessary arrangements for them to come back which is not always an easy thing to achieve," explained the police superintendent in charge of St. Ann, Stanford Davis.
"Sometimes we find that many of them simply don't want to bother with the hassle despite the fact that we usually provide plane tickets and accommodations for them. When they do return, though, the rate of convictions are very high."
Mr. Davis conceded that the process of getting overseas witnesses to return to Jamaica to testify was expensive, and said that all efforts were now in place for cases to be resolved before victims are ready to leave the island.
"We can't hold people in jail indefinitely and if there is no evidence there is no case," he said. "What we are doing more prevalently nowadays is to utilise the weekend courts where cases involving crimes against visitors can be dispensed with quickly."
But Corporal Denton Allen, from the Ocho Rios Police Station, noted that weekend courts in the resort town were only reserved for special emergency sittings and only in the event that there can be a quick apprehension of suspects.
"The weekend court, because of its expeditious nature, can be effective if the evidence against the suspect is very strong," he said. "If it cannot be resolved and the visitor has to leave the island then, if the case is very critical to us, we try by all means to get the visitor to come back and testify. Without a witness, however, there is not much that we can do. I have seen where we have had to let people we believe are guilty go because of witnesses refusal to come back to testify."
Recently, two men were held by the police in connection with several robberies on the north coast, including the gunpoint robbery of two foreign couples at a popular attraction in Ocho Rios. Both couples, one a British pair and the other from the United States, have since returned home.
Local authorities are trying to get the victims to return to testify against the men. However, there has been resistance.
"The American couple, based on the dialogue we have had with them, have shown the most interest in wanting to come back and testify," revealed the owner of the attraction, who did not want to be named in this story. "The British couple, on the other hand, appear most reluctant to come back despite a promise from the local authorities to furnish them with bodyguards while they are here."
Enel Brydson, island coordinator for the resort patrol, while noting that crimes against visitors have been reduced by nearly 50 per cent compared to the period 1999 to 2000, sees the advent of weekend and night courts as a deterrent to criminals.
"There is really not much to hinder justice here in this country," he explained. "I have seen where a Resident Magistrate (RM) has walked out of church and straight into court to try one of these emergency cases. The RM is like a doctor on call and the police knows where to find them."
