The Editor, Sir:

The newspapers blare the headlines: "FORTY-SEVEN KILLED IN SEVEN DAYS", and fear grips the nation. In the evenings the streets remain deserted as city residents cower behind barricades, behind electrified gates, armed guards, canine sentinels and burglar bars. Stray dogs and the mentally deranged, outcasts of the society, forage hopefully through mounds of rotting refuse for the occasional scrap of sustenance.

Even those faithful denizens of the local rum bars have sagely forsaken their posts, the survival of the flesh having eclipsed the need to imbibe the spirits. The occasional vehicle speeds by, deep-tinted windows masking the anxiety of its fearful occupants as they furtively contemplate the shortest and safest course home.

As the murder toll has reached a new high, morale in Jamaica has achieved a new low. Denial of the warning signals for years, and a refusal to confront the darkness that has long loomed over the nation has deepened the crisis. It is only now that "The Stalker" threatens the civil liberties of the privileged that we seek to implement measures, extreme and drastic, to contain and return it to Pandora's box, so we can get on with the business of surviving. It is a daunting prospect.

With the approach of the season of silly spending and giving to those already in possession, hope springs eternal in the human breast. A hope that we have not gone past the point of no return, a hope that those in authority will remove the scales from their eyes and be moved to action to quell the mounting tide of terror. A hope that whatever good sense remains will cause our civilian and uniformed renegades to still the sound of their shooting, and let us live in some semblance of peace.

I am, etc.,

KADENE PORTER

kadene26@hotmail.com