This kind of situation is intolerable. It undermines public confidence in all police officers and therefore exposes them to ridicule and contempt. We do most sincerely commiserate with those good cops who must abide the degradation that is done by a criminal remnant in the ranks.
In the ultimate analysis, no one is to be more feared than a person who is armed, dangerous and trigger-happy. If he happens to be a ‘bad apple’ police officer, things go from bad to worse.
Since, public safety, public order and public health -among other public issues- are essential nation building details; we fully expect that a truly caring government would articulate its own vision for the future.
The public needs to know, feel and believe that it has a government that can protect them. Contrariwise when that same public loses faith in the government’s capacity or will to take care of them, that same public will rush to defend itself.
This is precisely what is happening when a frightened citizen applies for a gun license under the guise that he is a bird hunter and that he wants to search out and kill small game.
The day comes when his gun is stolen, when its barrel is shortened and when some innocent businessman or terrified householder is gunned down with the same weapon.
Crime hurts practically every one. Indeed there is a sense in which crime continues to hurt long after there is an initial report concerning any one outrage or the other. This is so because reports of crime are invariably widely disseminated by all media. This has the inevitable effect of magnifying the impact that crime has on society.
Whenever the police say that they were obliged to kill some one, the attentive public wants and gets answers. The problem is that some times the answers do not come quick enough.
Indeed, when reports are finally done the damage has already been done. Here reference is made to what seems the core of the problem in Bahamian society, which is that delay is piled upon delay and the public is left totally dissatisfied.
A chill runs down the spine whenever we hear the news of an occasion when some civilian or the other is gunned down by a police officer, presumably in the execution of his duty as a police officer.
In this regard, we are particularly grieved when the person gunned down is a young unarmed Bahamian man. Some times we are obliged to wonder if there is some kind of undeclared war.
Our thoughts are today turned in this direction as we take note of yet another killing of yet another young man. That he happens to be a black young man may be due to the fact that they are the ones who routinely cross paths with the police.
Sometimes the encounter proves fatal. On occasion unfortunately, a police officer is shot dead. At other times, the criminal is ‘dropped’. When he is an armed criminal, he often deserves death.
But yet again, there are occasions when a totally innocent person is killed.
While we do not know precisely what did go down in the most recent police shooting in Pinewood Gardens, we were totally appalled as we listened to eye witness accounts that were at compete variance with what the police had to say about the matter at hand. It is said that the Police shot a man who tried to evade them by taking off in a car.
As in matters such as these, there will be a Coroner’s Court and the public will get to know some of what it needs to know about this latest police killing.
From time to time the public is warned about this or that dangerous criminal on the loose. The advice the public gets is invariably concerned with reporting the legend that the miscreant is presumed to be armed, that he is presumed to be dangerous, and that they should be approached with caution.
Put otherwise, the public is being forewarned that they could be in the path of danger.
Sadly, this advice concerning how the public should protect itself from criminals and other social predators now seems strangely appropriate concerning certain ‘bad apples’ on the police force.
Editorial from The Bahama Journal
