Who says crime doesn’t pay?
Perhaps it’s because of the economic crunch, or maybe it’s just a one-off blip on the radar, but more people who call Crime Stop with information these days are asking for their reward.
Up to last Wednesday, Crime Stop had paid out $2 million since the start of the year, almost three times the usual amount.
“Usually we pay out maybe $700,000, at maximum, in a year. But this is $2 million and the year hasn’t finished,” said Crime Stop coordinator Prudence Gentles. “And it’s picking up again. In the past week we got 10 firearms off the streets.”
With one out of every seven calls to the toll-free line leading to an arrest and charge, Gentles described Crime Stop as “very effective”. Her staff members are now training the team that will man the phones for Operation Kingfish, the government’s latest initiative that will coordinate its efforts to fight organised crime.
“The anonymity part of it is what they (Kingfish) are trying so hard to maintain. They want to make sure that people feel confident and safe calling their number as well,” said Gentles.
However, it is this anonymity – preserved by Crime Stop’s conscious effort to ask its callers as little information about themselves as possible – that has made it so hard to figure out what’s behind the sudden increase in requests for rewards.
“I can only guess that it’s for economic reasons, I don’t know. Maybe people just need to get some money,” theorised Gentles. For the last 13 years, she has worked with a staff of seven team members in the two cramped rooms that are Crime Stop’s offices.
Over the years, some people have had no problem going to the office to pick up their reward, but others have made some unusual requests.
“We have dropped off money underneath the Causeway Bridge, we have dropped it off in a garbage bin, and we have dropped it at the front desk of an office. So there are many varying ways,” said Gentles.
“It’s just that some people are very wary, and I can understand that. And we just have to try and make them as comfortable and as safe as possible when they call.”
Callers are given a code number and once they supply that to Crime Stop officials, the reward money is paid out – or delivered to wherever they suggest.
“We send it through Western Union, we put it into some people’s accounts,” said Gentles. “We don’t know if those people are the actual people who have called or if they have asked somebody to act as a go-between, and we don’t care.”
In a country where there is an “informer fi dead” culture, the aim is to offer callers a safe environment in which to supply information. Crime Stop team members go to primary and all-age schools across the island and, with colourful stickers and rulers, try to get the message across that it’s okay to give the police information.
The fact that no one has ever been harmed as a result of calling Crime Stop has helped, Gentles said.
“Bad news travels faster than good news. There is no reason why we would want to know anybody’s name. We don’t want anybody to come to harm,” she said.
Since it was launched 15 years ago, the programme has paid out $7.5 million, including this year’s unusual sum. Most people do not ask to be paid; and even though the 55 people who asked for rewards this year is more than usual, they are less than eight per cent of the 713 calls that led to 67 arrests up to the end of September.
But even that small number of requests for payment has put a strain on the programme’s resources.
“Since the start of this year, we have really depleted our funds significantly (by paying out rewards),” said Gentles.
Prudent financial management and donations have pushed up the balance of the programme’s investment fund from $1 million in 1989 to a little over $10 million today; but based on the current trend where callers ask for payment, Gentles thinks they will need more money.
“We need more money, that’s definitely one of the things on my wish list,” she said. “We need the money just to help run the programme and to help the reward fund. If we go on as we are now, we would need at least another $5 million, but it’s difficult to know if this (increasing request for rewards) is just a blip.”
The investment fund remains intact, to be repaid to donors or charities if the programme ends, and Crime Stop’s expenses are met through the interest generated from the fund. Except for the money that the government supplies for the money-for-guns project, all of the programme’s funding comes from the private sector. The Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica keeps the books and Gentles was unable to supply even a rough estimate of the annual budget, saying it varies.
Crime Stop is now sending out proposals to various members of the private sector, trying to get partners to sign on to marketing campaigns that will peg their donations to the programme to a percentage of sales.
Being able to trot out statistics about the work that the programme has done may help.
The programme’s effectiveness is assessed based on the ratio of calls to the number of people arrested and charged. Over the last 15 years, up to the end of this September, 228 of the 1,646 calls that led to an arrest and charge were for murder cases.
The success rate has ranged from one-in-five to one-in-eight over the years; and there have been 900 calls annually, on average. One out of seven calls, so far this year, has resulted in either an arrest, the recovery of a firearm or the seizure of illegal drugs. Of the 67 persons charged this year, 13 were in connection with murder cases.
“The calls we get are very good quality calls,” said Gentles.
According to data on the Crime Stoppers International website, since the programme began, and up to September of this year, there were 115,789 arrests as a result of calls made to Crime Stoppers, Canada. There were 340,029 in the USA for the same period, and based on the statistics supplied by the operators of 1,165 Crime Stoppers programmes around the world, there were 554,890 arrests made over the last 28 years.
In Jamaica, Gentles said, the number of calls have remained fairly steady over the years. But there have been a few notable trends.
“Our calls drop in the Christmas season and they go up, usually, at the beginning of August, during back-to-school time,” she said.
“I think it’s because people want money (to buy school supplies) and whenever there’s a holiday, people don’t have time to call. Our calls drop over holiday time, including Easter and Emancipation.”
Payments range from $20,000 for information leading to the recovery of a shotgun, $40,000 for information about a murder case, to a high of $60,000 for the recovery of a high-powered rifle.
“And if somebody is caught with one of these illegal firearms and he is obviously a gunman, there is an additional $25,000 for the arrest,” she said.
So a caller who guides the Crime Stop team to someone with a high-powered weapon in his possession would collect $75,000.
Payments are made after someone is charged with the crime, not upon conviction in the courts.
“That is what crime stoppers around the world use as the standard,” explained Gentles. “We are a member of Crime Stoppers International and there are certain guidelines you have to adhere to, and one of them is you do not pay out on conviction, it has to be an arrest and charge.”
She added: “And that is because in several areas, maybe not the United States and Canada where crime stoppers started, but in many other places, it takes too long to get to the conviction part. And that would not be an incentive to anybody.”
She could not supply any data on the number of convictions that have resulted from calls to Crime Stop over the years.
“We tried to get that data once and it is nigh impossible, because our court systems are not computerised,” she said. “I would have to go into each courtroom and track each case from Montego Bay to Morant Bay. We tried it once for about a couple of months and it was nigh impossible. I would need 50 people on staff to do that.”
But even if she has given up on ever tracking the conviction rate, Gentles would like to get another four members of staff. The need is not urgent, she said, but more hands would be a big help.
The toll-free number is manned 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and Crime Stop team members do much more than take information about where to find a gun or a wanted man. There have been calls from people who are thinking about suicide, calls from young girls who are being sexually abused by a family member, and others from people who are simply lonely and need someone to listen.
“Late at night we get all sorts of distress calls from people who are lonely, who are having problems. They will call and ask where they can turn to. Crime Stop personnel are not trained counsellors but they offer a listening ear and refer them to the relevant agencies where necessary,” Gentles said.
Crime Stop has even helped get callers into the government’s Witness Protection Programme in a few cases.
“It’s something that we can arrange if people want, but the majority of the people just call and give the information. But the possibility is there to assist them to get into the witness protection programme if the need arises,” said Gentles.
Crime Stop pay scale
Calls relating to Reward to caller after arrest and charge
Shotguns and revolvers $20,000
Murder $40,000
Semiautomatic pistols $40,000
Submachine guns $40,000
High-powered rifles $60,000
Person caught with illegal firearm $25,000 extra
Crime Stop stats
Paid out so far this year $2M
Paid out in last 15 years $7.5M
Calls that led to arrests this year 713
Calls the led to arrests in last 15 years Average of 900 per year
Number of arrests this year 67, including 13 murder cases
Number of arrests in the last 15 years 1,646, including 228 murder cases
Success rate this year One in seven calls lead to arrest
Success rate over last 15 years Ranges from 1:5 to 1:8
Unusual reward money drop-off points
Underneath the Causeway Bridge
Inside a garbage bin
The front desk of an office building