PRESSURE from civilians to use deadly force, coupled with the paramilitary culture of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) and the never-say-die attitude of many criminals are some of the things driving police killings in the island.

This is according to an academic paper written by Dr Herbert Gayle which looks at, among other things, why the society allows the murder of Jamaican police officers and inner-city youth.

"It is no secret that some police have a belief that there are elements within the criminal class (who) only respect superior force and are, therefore, willing to confront them whatever the cost," Gayle said in the paper, which was informed in part by his 2001 to 2006 investigations of the deaths of 51 police officers over 15 years.

"This is compounded by active encouragement of some citizens who implicitly and explicitly encourage police to use deadly force on criminals," he added.

The anthropologist of social violence said these citizens are often those who have been victims of a criminal act, but who are unwilling to trust the judicial system to get justice.

The result then, Gayle said, is that they encourage the police to 'kill them (criminals) when you catch them because we are not going to court'.

And, perhaps, there is little wonder why. Jamaica has a murder rate of over 50 per 100,000 in a population of 2.6 million people. The result is that fear of being a victim of crime pervades society among civilians and among members of the police force, researchers, including Gayle, have found. Police Commissioner Owen Ellington has refuted this, insisting JCF members are unafraid and are trained and ready to deal with any eventuality.

Meanwhile, Gayle's paper said that the promotion of the use of force among members of the Jamaica Constabulary is further fuelled by citizens who insist on inquiring of the police how many people they have killed.

"Machismo is also encouraged among the policemen and women by members of the public who routinely question the police about their record of fatal shootings. Where the response is 'none', the civilian reaction is often disappointment," he said.

"This is largely because of the culture of admiring tough policing and which some see as the answer to the crime and violence. Of course, this is not helped by frequent policy postures of being 'tough on crime and on criminals'," Gayle added.

"These messages and the pressure to reduce crime, when coupled with the readiness and willingness of criminals to engage the police in fire fights, create pressure on the police and this, in turn, may very well influence the use of force decision," he said further.

There is evidence of this as one examines the history of policing in Jamaica where tough policing strategies have yielded short-lived successes even as police and civilian casualties increase.

For example, the increase in murders from 152 in 1970 to 232 in 1973 — following the general elections of 1972 — prompted the passage of the Suppression of Crime Act of 1974, giving police extra common-law powers of detention. By 1978, murders were up to 381.

Then, following the 1980 election, which saw 889 people murdered, the police again stepped up their tough policing. The result was that while murders went down to 484 in 1984, the number of civilians killed by police went to a record 354, bringing the total number of violent deaths in Jamaica that year to 838.

And then, Gayle said, there is the pervasive paramilitary culture within the JCF, which persists despite the police's best efforts.

"Even though the JCF has sought since 1998 to move away from reactive, paramilitary responses to crime and disorder and embrace community-based policing and intelligence-led policing strategies and tactics, there has not been enough of a culture shift either within or outside of the Force to reduce the dependence on deadly force," he said.

The implications, the paper said, are potentially dire.

"This could mean that the murder of police by criminals and police killings of civilians may not decrease noticeably in the current environment," Gayle said.

But this is strongly refuted by Superintendent James Forbes, head of the police Community Safety and Security Branch.

"The records don't lie, they only force liars to reckon," said Forbes, pointing to records that show a recent reduction in fatal shootings by almost 50 per cent.

He also pointed to records showing that in recent months, only one policeman was killed in the line of duty, and suggested this meant there had been less confrontation between civilians and law enforcement officers.

Gayle's research had also indicated community policing is not necessarily getting the support it needs.

"There are many Jamaicans — from policymakers to middle class (folk), rural folk (and) inner-city dwellers who support the police and youth killing each other. In fact, community policing in Jamaica has been quietly rejected as feminine by many police officers and the society as a whole".

"Many persons in community policing are given no recognition, as this is not seen as policing," noted the researcher and lecturer at the University of the West Indies.

Not so, countered Forbes, who says the recent reduction in the murder rate is attributable, at least in part, to increased support for the community policing strategies of the JCF.

"There have been more neighbourhood watches that have been formed in the month of May 2011 alone than in the last 7 years.

"This speaks volumes, because this is happening when crime is down, that they are being formed when crime is on the decline," said Forbes.

"It shows that people are into it, people are supporting the community-based approaches to law enforcement."

He went on to add that there are 11,000 police youth club members and his unit is well on its way to doubling that figure by the end of the year, something that he feels would be unlikely to happen, if there was little real support for community policing.

Commenting that the business sector and the music fraternity have also created a very successful partnership with law enforcement that is bearing fruit, Forbes noted that even other Caribbean countries are asking for Jamaica's help with their law enforcement strategies, which have garnered high-level praise.

"We have heard people from the Hague say what Jamaican law enforcement is doing now can be deemed as textbook material for law-enforcement scholars around the world," he said.

Gayle suggested in his paper that a part of the solution to curbing the police killings and the numbers of police being killed lies in ensuring that both groups have access to justice.

"We ascribe a value to the lives of both inner-city youth and front-line police, both of whom are unfortunately from the underclass. We do not say it, but we know that the police come from the poorest homes — many in fact from garrisons... Jamaicans are extremely classist. We treat the death of anyone from the merchant class in this country as a catastrophe and the death of a peasant with indifference," he said.

The consequence, Gayle said, has been the creation of structural violence against garrison youth and front-line police.

"None can expect to get justice or social support. The logic is therefore clear that they must, by design, kill each other.

"Again and again, year-by-year, the police will kill youth and they, too, will justify killing the police — and this feud between them will continue to maintain a political economy of violence in Jamaica," he said.

"Police deaths and the correspondent death of youth by the police are tied to the degree of violence in the society — but even more important is the factor of acceptance by the society of the death of 'others' or those with whom we do not identify," Gayle concluded.

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