THE security minister, Peter Phillips, warned criminals yesterday that law-abiding Jamaicans will not surrender to them, while the head of the Police Federation urged the government to urgently resume capital punishment to send a message to killers that they will pay.

In fact, Sergeant David White, speaking at the funeral of murdered Senior Superintendent Lloyd McDonald, told the government that if there was no money to pay the hangman, there were plenty people who would do the job for free.

“To the government, I say activate the duty of the hangman,” an emotional White said to loud applause as he paid tribute to his slain colleague during a funeral service at the Seventh Day Church at Port Henderson Road, Portmore.

“If it is an economic matter (why capital punishment has not been carried out) then there are those among us who will do it for you,” White added.

Capital punishment remains on the books in Jamaica, but no one has been hanged here since the mid-1980s, stalled, first because of disagreements in the government and the legislature over capital punishment and more recently because of a series of rulings by the Privy Council that has made it easier for convicts to lodge various appeals to the death penalty.

However, White and others in the Police Federation, which represents rank-and-file cops, have consistently argued for the implementation of the law on hanging, which opinion polls have consistently shown have strong support.

The government, in its manifesto for the general elections 16 months ago promised legislation to close out some of the legal loopholes used by convicts to delay capital punishment but is yet to bring the bills to Parliament.

But the issue was put forcefully back on the agenda by White in his tribute to McDonald, 46, who was shot dead in a marked police car on February 20, at the intersection of Waterloo Road and Devon Road in Upper St Andrew.

As McDonald slowed down at the corner, a powerful motor bike came alongside. In a flash, eyewitnesses claimed, the pillion rider got off and shot McDonald five times in his head. The gunman then took the cop’s service pistol and rode off.

McDonald was the most senior policeman killed in Jamaica in recent memory. An average of a dozen cops a year are killed in Jamaica, where murders, in recent years, have hovered to near 1,000 annually.

“How many police officers must be killed before we declare an emergency offensive against the animals in this country?” White asked.

He added: “To cold-blooded criminals your pay day is coming… There is a wicked trend that is brewing in this country and we must find a way to put a stop to it.”

Phillips, who read a lesson at the funeral service, did not respond to White’s sharp remarks, but took a moment to send a direct message to the criminals.

“Those who challenge the foundations of our country with their criminality must know that we will never surrender,” he told an audience that included several senior police officers as well as Opposition Leader Edward Seaga, for whom McDonald once served as a bodyguard.

“The police have assured me that they have major leads in solving this crime,” Phillips said.

Apart from Seaga and his wife Carla, yesterday’s mourners included:

. Derrick Smith, Opposition spokesman on national security;

. Deputy Police Commissioner Lucius Thomas, who represented Police Commissioner Francis Forbes;

. Deputy Police Commissioner Jevene Bent;

. Senior Superintendent Donald Pusey, head of the Special Anti Crime Task Force;

. Deputy Superintendent Cornwall “Bigga” Ford of the Flying Squad; and

. Senior Superintendent Reneto Adams, the former head of the defunct Crime Management Unit.

McDonald’s casket was draped with the Jamaican flag with the cop’s hat and sword rested neatly on top of it. The policeman’s widow and her two daughters, Chantal and Danielle cried constantly and frequently hugged each other.

Second-form students from Wolmer’s Girls also attended the service dressed in their school uniforms, showing solidarity with their classmate, Danielle.

“We feel for her and wonder why we have to be growing up in such a cruel and violent world,” one of the students said. McDonald, who was serving at the Mobile Reserve at the time of his death, was buried with full honours at the Meadowrest cemetery in St Catherine.