THE Government, stung by an accusation that it has presided over the worst period of human rights abuses by the state in the last half century, last week insisted that fatal shootings by the police have fallen significantly under P J Patterson’s watch and provided a raft of statistics to defend its claim.

“For the entire Patterson Administration, fatal shootings by the police stood at 1,598 or 122 per annum,” said the prime minister’s press secretary, Sandra Graham.

She was responding to Daily Observer columnist Ken Chaplin’s January 4 article in which he said that state agents had trampled on the rights of citizens, and that over the last year the country had experienced the worst abuses ever seen in the last 50 years.

Chaplin, who once headed Jampress, the former national news agency now merged with the official Jamaica Information Service (JIS), is a former press secretary to Patterson whom the column named joint Person of the Year 2004 with Kingston Mayor Desmond McKenzie.

But the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) disagreed strongly with Chaplin’s analysis and reeled off statistics to prove the columnist had erred, insisting that complaints of human rights abuses related mainly to controversial police shootings and the effectiveness of investigative procedures and oversight bodies.

“For the seven-year period from 1982 to 1988 there were 1,686 or an annual average of 240 fatal shootings by the security forces, security guards and licensed firearm holders, compared with 993 or an annual average of 141 from 1989 to 1995,” said Graham.

The 1982 to 1988 period quoted by Graham relates to the Jamaica Labour Party Administration of then Prime Minister Edward Seaga.

“For the period 1996 to 2004, fatal shootings by the police stood at 1,223 or an annual average of 135 fatal shootings,” she said.

Pressing home the point, Graham asserted that in 1992, the year that Patterson became prime minister, there were 145 fatal shootings by police, security guards and licensed firearm holders. The number fell to 91 the next year but crept back up to 125 in 1994.

By 1995, the data was aggregated to show the breakdown of fatal police shootings which rose from 131 that year to 148 in 1996, then 149 in 1997. The numbers fluctuated over the next few years – 145 in 1998, 151 in 1999, 140 in 2000, and 148 in 2001. Since then, however, they have continued to fall. There were 133 in 2002, 113 in 2003 and 96 last year.

With police shootings accounting for the bulk of the fatal shootings by cops, security guards, soldiers and licensed firearm holders, the total figure has also fallen over the last three years, moving from 188 in 2001 to 170 in 2002, then 131 in 2003 and 115 last year.

But while welcoming the decrease in the number of deaths at the hands of state agents, the rights group Families Against State Terrorism (FAST) said there was still the need for even more to be done to protect the rights of citizens.

The falling numbers, said FAST convenor Yvonne Sobers, provided little comfort when viewed in the context of the people behind the figures.

“When I hear (the stats), the immediate image that comes to my mind is a seven-year-old Shakeira, who was shot by police on Christmas Eve night in the Old Braeton area,” she said. “In other words, the numbers are no comfort to the families whose children have been killed by agents of the state, who are paid to protect and serve.

“I wouldn’t hide behind those figures at all,” she added.

“It’s like saying somebody embezzled $200,000 and somebody else embezzled $50,000, so the one who embezzled $50,000 is better? No, no. That is absolutely no comfort, none at all.”

Her focus, she said, was on finding out why the system continued to fail to hold many state agents accountable.

“I would really not even want to deal with those numbers,” Sobers said. “I would want to deal with why it is that the police are still not being held accountable. What is it in the system, in the investigation. Is there something in the court system, why do the cases take so long?”

Fatal shootings by police, security guards, soldiers and licensed firearm holders from 1982 to 2004

Years –Total

1982 –236

1983 –254

1984 –358

1985 –273

1986 –179

1987 –205

1988 –181

1989 –162

1990 –148

1991 –178

1992 –145

1993 –91

1994 –125

Years –Total

1995 –144

1996 –164

1997 –177

1998 –156

1999 –169

2000 –169

2001 –188

2002 –170

2003 –131

2004 –115

Police –Soldier –Security Guard –Licensed Firearm holder

131 –4 –0 –9

148 –7 –0 –0

149 –13 –5 –10

145 –3 –0 –8

151 –8 –0 –10

140 –8 –1 –20

148 –9 –4 –27

133 –11 –3 –23

113 –6 –1 –11

96 –7 –2 –10