Submitted by POSH
Attorney General Adriel Brathwaite recently updated the public that crime is o the rise in the North of the island.
The culprit who shot two police officers in 2011 in Navy Gardens has pleaded guilty and was given bail by the court. Let’s just clarify that, SHOT 2 Police Officers, multiple times each. Not shot AT. Has admitted that he did it to the court. And has been released.
I don’t know how the powers that going forward are going to try to police this generation when they allow the thugs of the society to do as they like when they like. But the political elite and the same judge who released the scoundrel on bail can rest easy since the police stand between them and the thugs as a buffer.
I wonder if he had shot a member of Government or the Judiciary if I would be making this post now. I await the type of monkey sentence which will come from the court for the following charges:
Endangering life, serious bodily harm with intent, unlawful possession of a firearm and ammunition. I think 25-30 years would suffice. But my bet is that the judge will sentence the gentleman concurrently for 7 years, – 2 that he was already on remand and he will be free to continue to shoot more police having got away with it before, within five years time.
Who cares about the police anyway, they don’t have mothers, fathers, or children. Surely no one that reads this blog could care less about the police, since the police are like teacher’s and we’re all delinquents in school. They just want to stop our fun.
I wonder when they will attack the police station. Since our police officers are largely unarmed they make for easy targets. And with the seizures of guns we saw recently, they certainly have higher calibre weapons than the police. Since an ak-47 is a 7.62m NATO round. But I am sure the police will be confident in their .38 revolvers and judiciary behind them handing out monkey sentences to people who shoot them.
I wonder if the country of Jamaica looking at us now are saying, welcome to my world. We cry down Jamaica and Trinidad. But I sure bet they wish that they could turn back the hands of time and be as peaceful as us…but we squander how current relatively peaceful society. It will be gone. Maybe not now or in five years. But certainly within this generation (30) years. The only thing good about that is I am sure I and a few others who read this blog due to our age 50’s to 60’s we’ll be dead. And smiling dead.
Next time you meet an indifferent police officer who cares nothing about your problem at hand, ask yourself if you care about the problems they face. Also keep telling yourself it’s their job. It’s the job of the State to protect its citizens and its agents.
God bless you all and God bless BIM.
This is further proof of the need for a workable Sentencing Council in Barbados. Self-centred magistrates always act as if they have no one to answer to. Who guards the guards?
Drug dealers are given bail of Bds$1m, then elderly churchman caught with a few bullets, but no gun, is remanded in prison; serving police officers c aught in alleged wrong doing can be given bail, but boys on the block are remanded in prison for small amounts of marijuana.
The principle of bail is that the accused would not be in a position to interfere with witnesses or evidence.
If anyone can interfere with witnesses it is a serving police officer or the super wealthy.
Assaulting, far less shooting, any public service officer should be treated harshly.
Further, ban all guns in private hands, including those people with licences, then it it a serious offence to threaten to shoot or have an illegal gun in one’s possession.
Who is being served, protected, and reassured?
This apparent new trend isn’t so new after all.
Recall that “Buddy-Brathwaite” threw dynamite at the police back in the late 70’s or early 80’s if memory serves me correctly, and “Sandfly” gained some level of notoriety when he shot at them. This was back in times when only certain officers carried firearms. The remainder carried clubs.
But you’ve got to ask, “Why are the police enjoying such a healthy dose of disrespect such that it appears there will soon be “open season” on them?”
Maybe its those deep, dark, under-currents that are now coming to the surface. Maybe, just maybe, they aren’t what you always thought them to be.
Magistrates routinely ignore the provisions and intent of the Bail Act.
@ Robert Ross
But who are they answerable to? The Attorney General is also minister of justice, home secretary and Lord Chancellor rolled in to one. He is responsible for policy, reporting to parliament which is responsible to the electorate.
I am not a lawyer, (can’t even spell lawyer) but it appears to me as if the chief justice is responsible to the civil service commission/governor general for his appointment and the attorney for supervision of his day to day duties with the registrar providing administrative backup.
Why is our democracy not working?
It will take a long time to undo the morale damage Dottin has done to the RBPF but let us not forget the reason attorneys like Pilgrim walk all over the police in court is because not all police work stands up to legal scrutiny. Regarding the attitude of ‘ban all guns’, only someone who believes the state must coddle all of us like newborns would ever propose something so stupid; the most fundamental human right is the right to life and self-defence is at the top of the list of life-preservation (own and loved ones) methods. Why do we hear of no crimes where armed citizens were involved? Could it be because the criminals always choose soft targets? You want to create more soft targets? Dottin hated citizen-owned guns too BTW, the only person who should have had one under his dictatorship was him. Numerous police officers were refused firearm licenses by Dottin who was forced to arm them during working hours but sent them home to the same neighbourhoods unarmed after work.
Bad for the island, bad for tourism, my wife’s family and friends lived right there in navy gardens and these pin heads turn it into a policemen shooting gallery. I don’t know who is a bigger moron the shooter who lived around the corner or the judge who single handily has proclaimed it open season on the police. The only thing that made Barbados stand out from the other islands was safety and even that now seems to be undermined by inept judges. Let him out?????? ,I would have thrown away the key, I here it all the time, man you got my back well ……who has the policeman’s back someone brings a box of rubbish back to a store and people want to march, people threaten violence to the perpetrator lets see how this will play out and see if the bong smoking, blowhards will stand up for the police ,stand up for society and go after this judges job.
In our street business of looking for Fraud and the police not knowing who we are have been good for the most part. When they dont know who you are they behave different as to law ,We only ran in to Two so far 2 so far that are just Fools, They seem more to be bad boys them self with no care of the Sgt or Station Sgt above them , Seem as they were on drugs,or drunk , very bad behaved ,Just looking to start a fight and have the other as a witness , They did not get their way .
Some time you have to look at the real unwritten files and reports on some Police that is not noted, People on the street know who is good and who is a crook,, Lets hope the Police that were shot were ones . Some might need to wake up and not think some people are punching bags for them.
Just this year alone we have reports of being taken in by police and being hit or beat up , we have a few last year. Then the person to be found dead on the beach with his tongue missing ,police still not find the 2 person in this one and they know their names.
People know who the bad policemen are , lets hope if they look to shoot they dont shoot the good ones, Not all police are crooks.
Hal, In my country a defense barrister is usually spelled… l.a.w.y.e.r .. but pronounced .. L.I.A.R.
We know that the Attorney General Adriel Brathwaite is a crook , liar and scumbag.
Violet Beckles case, Voting fraud, cover and cover up , on going each day he is in office,
I thought it was common sense: the more the state arms itself the more the bad guys will arm themselves.
This is the excuse used by New Barbadians to arm themselves no doubt with high-powered guns such as Uzis and AK47s. I am sure if the police searched some of those mansions on the West Coast and those Swan Street stores they will be surprised at what they will find.
It is not a coincidence that the two most heavily armed nations in the world, the US and Switzerland, have the highest rate of gun deaths – both suicides and what the Americans call homicides.
Just look at the District of Columbia vs Heller, McDonald v Chicago, the 14th Amendment, Columbine, read anything by Stephen P. Halbrook – and you will see how an advanced nation and its 300m citizens can delude themselves.
Have a word with Obama about the savage murder of those school children at Sandyhook.
Do we need any more evidence. As for police killing people, again look at the US and UK.
@ Lawson
I am not a lawyer (I rest my case).
Atlantis which some believe to be a mythical city, is purported to have sunk in a single day.
Our island is also sinking, day by day, into an abyss whose proportions sensible men and women seem impotent to make any type of impact.
Barring some Law of Sharia or a Che type revolution, we see the signs of anarchy emblazoned across these field and hill…
I am stuck, unable to give my usual sanctiminious advice of an ole fart waiting for the “Coming of the Lord..” the ole backslider that I am, cussing and carrying on “like he mek he’self…”
Young men, shooting at policemen should be locked up, without bail fullstop? Why the interrogative?
There was a time when i would have written that without a question mark but time has passed and now with age comes wisdom, yeah right.
Now we have officers who, while on patrol in the Suzuki Jeeps, pass every rum shop, while in uniform, and after extorting a pint and a 1/2 bottle free of charge from the propietor, remain to finish that bottle, while their radios request their response to a crime in progress.
Now dont get de ole man started.
I remember well that young lady in Weston who the two officers, while investigating the breaking at her flat, raped her and laughed when she told them that she would report them to the police!!!
So here we have an interesting quandary, officers of the law, chosen from the society, drinking, smoking herb, sniffing cocaine, selling guns to criminals, raping, tiefing cell phones, officers who increasingly are more criminal-like in their characteristics being hired to uphold justice.
Led by Commissioners of Police who customarily wiretap the citizenry of their country, under the direction of the said country’s Attorney General, and aspiring Prime Minister, in the offing, not if Owen can help it, if he lives to 2016, and we are concerned about how a judge would grant bail to the shooter.
I have watched two police officers beat a young man for responding to them during what was his constitutional right to ask a question.
I have a good friend a rasta, who an officer, after taking a nikle plated 22 out of his ankle holster, told said rasta to pick up said weapon!!
Yes siree, impotent Police Complaints departments, ingrunt officers who, after you call them to report a crime being committed, ANONYMOUSLY, come into said district and proceed to ask dwellers if they know an ole fart by the name of “***” lives!!
I, ole fart *** used to have a healthy respect/fear for the police. Such was our upbringing in **** when Squires was *** we shook in fear when he spoke to our mother during his community beat.
How can i, as old as i am, with reverence embedded in these osteoporotic bones, respect uniformed criminals, those who i cannot call the CoP or the Office of the Impotent Ombudsman, or the Police Complaints Authority about?
Yh does get timed coming pun de blog to comment pun whu wrong in Bulbados eve’y day you know,
Plussing it getting harder to get pun de computer to type dis gibber causing de madam say dat “since so many uh de church members get lay off hey de udder day, de pastor gine increase de “Feed My Sheeps” to help de congreants dat suffering under Sinkliar and Fumble regime of Lies and Deceipt, otherwise called the DLP Manifesto “Pathways to Freedom 2008″
Dat is why, of recent, i en getting to come heah and pompaset wid my highfalluting self, wid my Holier Than Thou behaviours”
Yes siree dat is why AC ent get to deliver all dem kicks en ting dat she did promising to gi’ me las year, I did call de police about that physical violence threats en ting but, sincing my commentary heah does doan be too complimentary of de RBPF, dem din render too much assistance neider
This sort of leniency has been in the works for a number of years. There has been a slow but steady Europeanisation of the law courts here in Barbados for a number of years in terms of sentencing. There was also debate in the USA of the comments made by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg that the USA should look up to Europeans courts. We all know how lenient Europe is their sentencing and we all know the influence, the UK has on Barbados. And don’t get me started on the ‘human rights’ brigade.
@ Kevin
Steady on. I am sure you are not one of the people who gathered behind Glendairy volunteering to be the hangman. A well-known politician once told me that he had a worker who wanted to be the hangman, until his own son was accused of murder. Then he wanted to borrow money to get a ‘good’ lawyer.
It is in our DNA to hang first then ask questions after.
@Hal
How did the convo go from lenient sentencing to hanging? lol. If hanging still use to occur it would be the last and final resort being all appeals have been rejected.
H Austin
Yes you are right. But sadly it’s an old scent.
Hal said:
“This is the excuse used by New Barbadians to arm themselves no doubt with high-powered guns such as Uzis and AK47s. I am sure if the police searched some of those mansions on the West Coast and those Swan Street stores they will be surprised at what they will find.”
Hal….don’t think for a moment they don’t know who is actually importing all the arms and ammunition into Barbados, from what is public knowledge, they all know, including the judges etc who are said to be in the culprit’s pockets. Don’t hold your breath for the police to check Millennium Heights, Platinum Heights, the mansion by the radio station above Lower Estate, the many houses where Harris lives and owns. Right now people are pretty angry that the judiciary members would steep so low as to allow their tennis partners and golf partners to completely destroy the island, not to mention the millions of dollars being currently laundered on the island that SHOULD be seeing even the goddamn politicians doing some quality hardtime in a prison some part of the world…….let’s hope they know that all eyes are on them because of what they have become.
The police in Barbados should be more like the others around the world.
A 10 o’clock curfew was imposed in Bagdad
Everyone had to be off the streets or be shot
One man was shot and killed at 9.45 the policeman was brought to his superior who asked why he did that.
He answered I knew where he lived…..he wouldn’t have made it
@Lawson very funny. All in all my only two cents, is that everywhere has bad apples. But let’s look at it in general. Shooting at your state appointed law enforcement officers?
All accounts of the shot officers in Navy Gardens was that they were and still are officers of very high calibre. It wasn’t a sinister plan by the culprits, it was a patrol in the right place at the right time, depending on whose side you look at it from. Except the patrol got caught off guard.
Who decides to shoot police officers? There is no rehab for people who have gone that route. After Irene Sandiford Garner or whoever she name was robbed in Super Centre car park, then they had all this wide spread public debate about cash for gold which was going on for so long and then they passed the new metal dealers act.
All it looks is for an elite to face what ordinary citizens face and action is taken.
As someone who had been born and bred just between the prison and District A Police Station. I have a pretty good understanding of the collective psyche of the men as well as the women who constitutes the Royal Barbados Police Forces. Many of these guys are my friends who now constituted the higher heads in the Royal Barbados Police Forces of today. I knew Rat- Brown, Dirty- Harry, Track- Suit – Top, Invader 1 as well as 2, lion-Man, Big- Sam, Arthur, Taylor, Gittens, Wade Gibbons, Forte who is now in charged of the Task- Force, and many others. But more importantly, these guys were all members of the CID back in the 1980’s. And I one think I must say about these guys, they kept Barbados safe throughout the 1980’s if it meant shooting such criminals as Mark Young, Pat Rat, Big Michael, Harding, Hall, Sandy fly, Buddy, and Bend Toe etc. Some these criminals I’ve met when they were brought to the police lockup at District A, back in the early 1980’s. And let me tell you, they wouldn’t think twice about shooting or beating a police officer. But on a serious note, I saw the sacrifices these men and women made to keep Barbados civil in the 1980’s. Some have now gone on to the Lord, others have retired and the rest now constititutes the higher heads in the Royal Barbados Police Force. Retired Assistent Commissioner of Police Alvin Griffith: who I also knew personally, spent his entire career at the Royal Barbados Mounted Branch at District A. I founded this man to be a great human being. Who cared about justice and fairness in the prosecution of his job.
I wonder how many here remembered Barbados most notorious criminal Doctor Rat? And the police he shot back in the late 60’s… before he himself was shot dead by police on a boat. Yes! I was born and bred just behind District A Police Station and nothing really escaped my notice as child growing up in a law enforcement environment.
I could still remember the face of Barbados first high ranking Female officer: inspector Alga Mason who died early from cancer back in the 1970’s. She was a good woman who cared about the young people….
@Mark Fenty
Boy I can’t remember de last time I hear de name Doctor Rat! lol
And you’re quite right because it has been many years…. Donkey years for the lack of a better term….
I stand to be corrected on this one but if my memory serves correctly, I think Doctor – rat was from St. Vincent. In any event, I remembered quite vividly the morning Jasper Watson was on the hunt for Doctor – rat. He got in the police van with his SLR rifle the morning in question and unfortunately, he was shot by Doctor – rat that same day.
There was a criminal by the name of Pack Rat who hadn’t any fear of the police whatsoever; this I witnessed with my two eyes. And I knew this personally because a lot of my police friends also feared this man big time . This guy lived in Bush Hall and not to far from the National Stadium at the time. And he would physically harmed police officer every time there was an event held at the stadium. Until the decision was made to shoot this guy, and the police did so one evening at the stadium. But their did kill him though….the police just lighted him up in the foot. The good old 1980’s…lol…
I was at the National Stadium one night back in the early 1980′ s, when my good friend Marlon Moore a Mounted Police, was shot in the leg. You Know, a lot of times the Barbadian public is unaware of the violence police officers in Barbados encounteres during their career. I was there and I did witnessed alot of the violence some of my police friends, had to endured at the hands of the criminal elements in Barbados. So let not be hypocritical here because the door swings both ways people….
The criminals in Barbados today may not have the guts and determination of the Dr Rats, Mark Young, Buddy Brathwaite and the like. But what they may have to make them more vicious, and deadly are products of the Russian Sergeant kalashnikov and Israeli Major Uziel Gal.
The first thing that we have to do is launch a blitz on taking in these illegal firearms, and all we need to handle these criminals afterwards, are some size 12 boots and some bull pistles.
@ Mark Fenty
But how do we deal with the unarmed white collar criminals in this society, like the Clico fellow ,and those that preceded him from Trade Confirmers and others.
For people like these I would highly recommend a higher than normal Jersey barrier, equipped with an ash tray and a blind fold.
With all that is being said and looking at what is happening in the courts…… My question is why would a man or woman risk his or her life for us when we don’t care about them?
The GG don’t care, the PM don’t care, the AG don’t care, the Judges don’t care, the Magistrates don’t care and the general public don’t care, so really no one cares about the policemen and women.
The way Barbados is going we will all soon have to start looking for holes because the criminal element is taking over.
We will all be running to the police for help soon…… I hope that by the all of the police officers aren’t demoralized by then and we can get some help.
One thing I know for sure is that we can all sit in a corner and point fingers and hide and criticize but we must accept that we don’t have the balls to do that thankless work.
What the Royal Barbados Police Force lacks today is the kind of dedicated police of the likes of: Dirty Harry, Track Suit Top, Invader, Gibbons, Merrick, Taylor, Gitten, Arthur, Estwick, Rat Brown, Bynoe, Fancy Basket, Forte, Griffith, Bridgeman, Lion Man, Cummings, Robinson, etc. Now, believe when I tell you that I knew practically all of these guys on a personally and saw them worked around clock for days on end to caught the likes of: Mark Young, Harding, Hall and Sandy Fly etc.
And by the way…. all of these guys were members of the CID back in the 1980’s.
SHOT 2 Police Officers, multiple times each.
I find it difficult to believe how the criminal who did this could be released on bail.
I would love to hear the rationale behind what appears to be a really irresponsible decision.
It ALL boils down these days to dollars and cents……. Can’t pay the bills nor eat with dedication, plus who really cares about what’s going on? Answer me that.
Secondly why should a police be dedicated……. There is nothing in it for them other than hard work.
So dedication is a thing of the past
@ Hants
I would love to hear the rationale behind what appears to be a really irresponsible decision
Rationale?
….it was a Bajan court.
What rationale what?!?
No judgements no trials and yet the judges are being paid. Maybe they should send home a few of them too.
But what sense would that make…… Still will be paid their full salary. Hmmmmmmm!!!!!!!
Most people under the age of 35yrs. in Barbados wouldn’t have witnessed
the nightly trek of the fowls (chickens) coming home to their respective owner’s yards to bed down for the night. Nonetheless, invariably chickens
still do come home to roost even if their owners have a license to kill.
The politicians can take a great deal of blame for demoralizing the police force, when local bajan whites or other minority groups want access to certain places, of course being wealthy is a criteria, for example the port, and the police tell them no, they place a call to their favourite politician who places a call to the Commissioner, or better yet calls the poor cop who is doing his job and scare the hell out of him/her…there are many stories of that type of abuse of power perpetrated by politicians for those people who bribe them and continue to call shots in Barbados. Both DLP/BLP are guilty of this abuse of power, hence we see the continued degradation of the country.
Barbados has changed a great deal because shooting two police in Barbados back in the day meant sure death. Most criminals back in the day knew this unwritten rule… and if you were caught and brought back to the station( which really never happened) your physical health would probably never be the same again. Peter Bradshaw, a crimimal who shot a police in the eye, back in the late 80’s spoke of the continual beating he had gotten while in police custody. He was one of the lucker ones….!
I remembered when Harding was on the run the first time he had escaped from prison. And when CID tracked him down hiding in a tree down by the QEH and Rat Brown who was a got shot at time, shoot Harding several times in leg. The story was told by some of the guys that when the first bullet stroked Harding, he had been heard on the other side of the island.
An aside after a recent experience……….
If Magistrate Bannister takes the police station with him on the Bench, what does he take into the pulpit?
The RBPF the best police force in the Caribbean, period!
This may be true, but it does not get us very far.
Yet they get their confessions by means other than by best police procedures period!
Mark Fenty can attest to this, plus those cops who left the force and came to live New York.
@ The Fan | February 6, 2014 at 10:26 AM |
Go tell that to the two English ladies!
The PM made a similar claim about the Civil Service.
And where are you today? Over a fiscal cliff of no salvation.
What kind of managers would have allowed that path to be taken despite the many warning signs of danger ahead and knowing full well the dire consequences that same path travelled in 1991/93 would indeed present?
@ miller
How about the cost over-runs for major projects after the best civil servants in the world have done their cost/benefits analyses. Yet they go on to be permanent secretaries.
Good career moves with ministers who do not know a number from the man on the moon. Just ask the minister of finance to do his times table.
What we have is resentment from the masses who are saying if Leroy Parris and the politicians can steal and get off then my hungry ass can do crime and get bail. Simply as that!