News
BSI making progress, says Supt Gause
Friday, July 03, 2009
THE head of the Bureau of Special Investigation (BSI), the arm of the constabulary that investigates questionable shootings, yesterday dismissed claims by rights groups that it has been tardy in carrying out its work.
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| GAUSE. co-operate with investigators for speedy resolution of cases |
Assistant Superintendent Granville Gause said wild accusations against the BSI were often made without basis.
Gause, speaking at a press conference at Eden Gardens in Kingston, said that oftentimes people who appear before television cameras, purporting to be eyewitnesses to shootings, cannot be found and therefore unhelpful to the work of the BSI.
".Investigations later reveal that they were not really eyewitnesses; they were posing for the camera and names, addresses and telephone numbers turn out to be fictitious," Gause said.
He said, too, that people who demonstrate against questionable police killings were often seen on television displaying shell casings, but when detectives from the BSI go into the communities to collect evidence the spent shells are hidden.
"They are never handed over to the police where a chain of custody can be established for the court," Gause said.
Gause, however, urged citizens to co-operate with investigators for speedy resolution of cases.
He pointed to the case of Carlton Grant, son of popular entertainer Spragga Benz, who was fatally shot by police in downtown Kingston last year August.
The cops involved in Grant's killing, said Gause, are to be charged with murder and assault, following a ruling from the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions.
The fatal shooting of Richard Brown at Delacree Park in Kingston in January this year was another case which Gause said was dealt with quickly by the BSI. A ruling, he said, was made on the same day that the police involved be charged with murder.
Also, police involved in the questionable death of Broderick Wright in St Catherine in March last year, were only one week later charged with manslaughter, Gause told reporters.
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