ANARCHY reigned in the volatile McIntyre Villa section of Dunkirk yesterday, forcing the security forces to blanket the east Kingston community to contain the flare-up of violence that followed the police shooting – residents say murder – of a wanted man.

Irate gunmen traded bullets with the police, women screamed police excesses, and residents torched three police vehicles and blocked roads in protest of the shooting of Donovan Clarke, whom the police say had been wanted for murder and other crimes.

Clarke’s girlfriend – the police identified her as “a woman who was in the house with Clarke” – was taken into custody, but the police did not say she was under suspicion, nor did they name her.

The shooting of Clarke followed a raid on the community, between 6:00 am and 7:00 am.

Screaming residents alleged that the man was actually hiding in the ceiling of the house when the police shot him.

The Bureau of Special Investigations (BSI), the constabulary arm that probes all police shootings, was called in immediately to investigate and was on the scene mid-morning.

Dunkirk is among the most notorious of crime hot spots in Kingston, with frequent gang clashes and reprisals that have claimed human and animal victims.

In early 2005, scared residents fled the area after continuing violence claimed the life of 12 people over a six-week period.

In the bloodletting that occurred in the community, age offered no refuge as residents as old as 65 were callously gunned down. In one incident, a 15 year-old boy suffered injury as gunmen let loose on the residents before turning their weapons on two dogs, killing them on the spot.

The violence, attributed to a struggle for turf, saw at least six people reportedly killed by gunmen and 34 left homeless after a firebombing in the community over a two-month period later in the year.

In November 2005, Glenmore Hinds, the assistant commissioner of police who heads the Operation Kingfish Task Force, told the Sunday Observer that the police had severely disrupted the operations of two notorious gangs based in Dunkirk – the One Ten gang and the Top Road gang.

The community has remained relatively peaceful – until yesterday morning.

The Constabulary Communication Network (CCN), in the official police version of the events, said the raiding party was “greeted with heavy gunfire” on their approach to a house.

“The fire was returned and Clarke was hit,” said the CCN release.

But the report also acknowledged that the community had a different version of the events, saying that Clarke had not shot at the police, and that he was murdered.

Clarke was wanted for murder, shooting with intent and robbery. His community knew he was wanted, but said he should have been arrested and taken to court, instead of being killed.

“Dem neva haffi kill him, dem coulda carry him in,” said one resident who spoke to the Sunday Observer.

They complained that cops cordoned off a house at Block 5 in which Clarke, said to be in his 20s, and his girlfriend, whom they identified as Geraldine Chevannes, were asleep early in the morning.

The residents alleged that the lawmen shot off the locks on the grille and entered the house where they found Clarke hiding in the ceiling of the bathroom.

“You can see where them shoot up the ceiling and the blood drain down in the face basin,” a relative of Chevannes told the Sunday Observer.

The shooting incident spurred angry response from Dunkirk residents and gunmen in the community who, later in the morning, opened fire on the police party and set alight the three police vehicles.

“Them pin down and could not come out. Is later when more police come that them get to leave,” said an elderly resident, who witnessed the mayhem.

Two of the police vehicles, one a service vehicle and the other an unmarked police car, were burnt-out shells at the street corner where the police had earlier parked them and left to carry out the raid.

Residents pointed out to the Sunday Observer bullet holes in the parked vehicles and on walls – stark evidence of the gunfire that ensued earlier in the morning.

The police have not reported any recovery of firearms.

fosterp@jamaicaobserver.com