Photo by Dwight Nelson
Leo Lambert (left), manager of corporate services at Jamalco hands over computers to the Clarendon Police. Looking on from second left are Superintendent Dayton Henry, Lieutenant Commander Roger Powell, security head at Jamalco, William 'Billy' Shagoury, head of the Clarendon Crime Prevention Committee, Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin, commissioner of police, and Michael Ashley, department supervisor at Jamalco.

MAY PEN, Clarendon:

The Alcoa foundation and Jamalco presented a brand new intelligence unit and several computers to the Clarendon police at their headquarters in May Pen on Wednesday morning.

The establishment of the intelligence unit was sponsored by the Alcoa Foundation at a cost of US$65,000 (J$4.9 million) while Jamalco donated five new Dell computers to boost data services carried out in the parish.

The gift was presented in response to the high levels of crime which have been gripping the parish recently.

According to Leo Lambert, Jamalco's manager, corporate services, the intelligence unit would allow the members of the security force to get additional training in community policing, customer service management and customer relations.

"This unit provides a framework for a new type of policing that will take us into the future," said Lambert.

Speaking at the handover ceremony, Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin, commissioner of police, said in order to achieve a long-term, sustainable reduction in the levels of crime gripping the nation, "we are not going to shoot or hang our way out" but instead there had to be a multi dimensional approach.

Cauterise the symptoms

The commissioner said in order to achieve any levels of success in the fight against crime, the symptoms would have to be cauterised.

He also said the police force would now be concentrating on gangs, guns and community policing as areas of priority.

Commissioner Lewin stressed that although community policing was not new to the force, he would ensure that under his watch, it would be rolled out to every police area throughout the entire force.

- Dwight Nelson