A bare-chested Joel Andem, with his mouth taped, being led by police into the Horizon Remand Centre in Kingston yesterday morning. Andem was roused from his bed in Clarksonville, St Ann in a pre-dawn raid by the police and the military. (Photo: Michael Gordon)

JOEL Andem, the leader of the feared Joel Andem gang and the man at the top of the police's most wanted list for the past four years, was yesterday captured during a pre-dawn operation by police and soldiers in Clarksonville, a quiet community deep in St Ann near the border with Clarendon.

Andem, who was surprised by members of the constabulary and military in a six-bedroom house he shared with an elderly man, a woman and an infant, was immediately flown by helicopter to the Jamaica Defence Force headquarters at Up Park Camp, Kingston.

The gang leader, who was handcuffed and whose mouth was taped, was then taken to the New Horizon Remand Centre where he was last night interrogated by senior detectives from the CIB.

It was, however, not clear yesterday when Andem would appear in court.

"We are now going to sit down and try to combine forensic and human evidence to build a case against him in the courts," said deputy police commissioner Lucius Thomas.

The two adults who were in the house with Andem at the time of his capture were taken into custody and could be charged with harbouring a criminal, police said yesterday.

Andem, 40, was wanted by the police for murder, rape, extortion, kidnapping and robbery. His capture came after months of intelligence gathering by members of the Military Intelligence Unit and the Special Anti-Crime Task Force, an elite unit in the police force led by tough crime-fighter Senior Superintendent Donald Pusey.

Police said yesterday that Andem offered no resistance when he realised that he was cornered by members of the security forces.

"He was trembling like a badly-tuned truck," Pusey told the Observer yesterday. "He offered no resistance and even told us we would not find any guns there."

An officer who took part in the operation said a thick sheet of fog covered the area during the early morning raid and visibility was very poor.

"We couldn't see past our noses and had to crawl up to the house," the cop reported.

The capture of the country's most wanted criminal was hailed by the police commissioner, Francis Forbes, and security minister, Peter Phillips.

Forbes, who returned to the island yesterday from Trinidad and Tobago where he attended the Caribbean Police Commissioners' Conference, hailed the work that was put into nabbing the notorious gangster.

"Over many, many months we have made several attempts to capture this well-known criminal but he has always been able to evade us because no one has been able to get close to him. He trusted no one," Forbes told reporters at a press conference at the Norman Manley International Airport, shortly after his arrival from Trinidad.

"It was a very good exercise of joint co-operation between army and police in what is essentially a major security success," said Forbes.

Phillips, in congratulating Pusey and members of the police and military who were involved in the capture, said the success of the operation was due to the high level of intelligence and expertise utilised.

Phillips told the security forces to maintain the pressure on what he called the elements of criminality, and warned that the police would now be going after "key figures" of organised crime and men of violence who prey on vulnerable communities.

At the same time, Deputy Commissioner Thomas, the crime chief, said the drive to pursue those who had run afoul of the law would continue. "There are still others out there to be captured," Thomas told reporters yesterday.

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