A Blog I Have Been Reluctant to Write

For quite a few reasons, I have been reluctant to write this blog on some happenings involving the police, all of which occurred in the past few weeks.

I was running a few miles from home with a small group one day, when we passed a police car pulled over to the side, and a motorist who was pulled over. We came by at just that precise moment to both see the complaining motorist hand over some money to the policemen, in a way that looked to my untrained eye as if both parties were trying to avoid being seen doing to the handoff.


A week or so later, I was driving through a different neighborhood in the dead of morning, and as many Jamaican drivers do, I paused at the light and went through the red. The number of hijackings in Kingston make stopping at red-lights in the middle of the night a risky proposition.

As I drove through I saw a policemen flagging me down. I pulled over and he asked me "how I could just run through the red light like that?" I explained: "Officer, mi fraid like puss dis time a mawnin'!" (Officer, I am as afraid as a cat at this time of the morning!")

He asked me for my license and registration, and I explained that I had my registration but I did not bring my wallet for safety reasons. He said that I would "definitely be going to court."

A couple of other cars came by, and he pulled them over also. By the time he returned I was getting quite nervous, although not nearly as nervous as I have ever felt in the US whenever I got pulled over (with Rodney King images flashing through my mind.) Basically, he said "I am going to warn you to not go through lights again, and to remind you that we all need to take care of each other, because one hand shakes the other."

I heartily agreed.

Not until I drove off did I realize that I may have promised to support the police with a small cash "contribution" if and when I got stopped the next time, and that the only reason I got off was that I did not have my wallet.

A few weeks ago a Belgian friend of mine told me that she was driving with a European friend of hers when she was also stopped by the police for speeding. She has been living in Jamaica since September.

She was quite direct with her policemen "Is there any way you could take care of this for me, because it would take so much time for me to go in and pay the fine and all that?" She paid him, and was quickly on her way, having saved herself time and money.

I had a mixture of feelings, after my run-in partly due to the way in which the policeman said what he said. Frankly, it felt more the good advice from an older uncle, than what I thought would be a real-life case of "police corruption." It sounded more like a plea for help, than an ominous warning, or some kind of veiled threat. I was quite happy to have gotten off, and felt in my bones that I was so relieved that I might have easily paid over the J$1000 (US16) he was probably looking for.

One thing I am acutely aware of, is how we ordinary Jamaicans contribute to the crime wave that we have experienced for the past 30 years.

As I thought about it some more, I realized that if I had taken the easy way, I would have added to the problem that the police say is at the core of their inability to apprehend criminals -- people do not trust them with inside information.

I could see why.

I felt as if I had the power to buy off a policemen at that stop-light, and that it was just a matter of having the right amount of money at hand. What kinds of crimes could I have purchased my way out of, if I really wanted to, and if I had the cash?

AS I thought about it some more I felt a creeping nakedness... that the barrier I imagined between myself and a criminal out there was simply dissolving before my eyes. It was very disconcerting.

After all, I have already learned that a call to the police is not the first to make. Instead, that call should be made to one's security company. After all, the security companies hire more people than any other industry in the island, and the overall impression is that they are very, very good.

I believe that when it comes down to it that I will gladly spend a day in court, rather than contribute to removing the protection I sometimes like to think I have. Or at least, in my mind I am planning to do so -- we shall see when the time comes.

Incidentally, my reluctance from writing this blog comes from being traces -- that somehow a disgruntled policeman might think I am writing about HIM.

P.S.> There was a cover story in today's Jamaica Gleaner entitled Cop Killings Rise -- Repeat Offenders Causing Concern. The fact is, not a single policeman has been convicted of a shooting crime since 1999. This in a country that has one of the highest rates of police shooting per capita.