When 46-year-old Isroy Panther swore that he did not own an illegal firearm, even hardened cops wanted to believe the shy, softspoken resident of Southside, one of the most violent of the capital city’s sprawling slums.

But the next day, Flying Squad detectives swooped down on the community and found an Israeli-made M1 submachine gun, along with 80 rounds of assorted ammunition, in a room occupied by Panther at Bowens Road in the tough Central Kingston enclave.

Police are convinced the firearm was forced upon him for safekeeping. Because of his age and usually quiet disposition, the criminals in the community believe that he would be a good person to keep their ‘tool’ as he was unlikely to be targeted by the police, unless they were tipped off.

Panther’s story is typical of the harsh reality being experienced by thousands of inner-city residents who live under an unwritten code of silence imposed by criminal gunmen. To break that code could mean swift death.

“We believe this gun was forced on him and he had no option but to keep it in his house or face certain death,” Detective Inspector Altemoth ‘Parra’ Campbell told the Sunday Observer.

Campbell led the operation which netted the gun that Panther, on pain of death, was forced to lie to police about.

“Those people out there who are bashing us need to understand the harsh reality of these communities,” said the senior cop, a reference to the popular charge that the police are ineffective in quelling crime in the inner-cities. “They are under siege,” he added.

Despite what police believe, Panther, a racehorse groom, is likely to be found guilty and sentenced to prison for illegal possession of firearm and ammunition.

Campbell stated a well-known fact: that the fight against crime was made much more difficult because the residents were fearful of the violent reprisals that could follow if they failed to heed the criminal mantra that “informer fi dead!”

“They are living with a gun to their heads and have been scared into submission,” Campbell complained.

One garrison community resident who asked not to be identified, confirmed the cop’s words, saying that life in these communities was controlled by the gang members who dictated when residents could go or come.

“When them a war with other gang them send out the message say we must stay off the streets ’cause a bad man a go run the streets and them no response fi anybody who get shot,” the resident said.

But the cycle gets worse, as the criminals are targeting the young boys and girls in the community.

Young boys who do not gravitate towards the gangster life are targeted by gang members who do everything in their power to recruit them into a life of crime, warning them that death will be the consequence of non-compliance.

“Whe me live them call out the young boy them and gi dem gun and order them fi bleach and watch the ends,” the resident disclosed. “Them tell them say if them nuh do it them a go kill them and them family so them nuh have no choice.”

Women and young girls are often the victims of carnal abuse, rape and other sexual offences. And many of these crimes, though witnessed, have gone unreported, police said.

It is an open secret in these areas that young girls, some of them barely into their teens, are being taken advantage of by unscrupulous adult men. One mother who lives in a volatile St Catherine community said she has been forced to move out her two teenage daughters after a feared gang leader began making suggestions that he wanted them to participate in a threesome with him.

“Him always a come with a wicked smile and a ask fi dem,” the woman told the Sunday Observer. “Mi no want them fi bruk out inna dem thing deh yet because them a do well in school. A couple girl well in the area him bad up and bow them up.”

Inspector Duetress Foster-Gardner of the Centre for Investigation of Sexual Offences and Child Abuse has first-hand knowledge of what victims of these crimes undergo.

“We know gang people are commanding people’s daughters to do all kinds of dirty acts. The victims themselves are afraid and withdraw the information,” Foster-Gardner said.

“We have to think of their safety and that of their loved ones because their fear is legitimate. Where are they going to live?”

She however encouraged persons who were abused to come forward with the information so the law could take its course.

“We will sometimes withhold the information until the victims and their families have been relocated and then we move in on the perpetrators,” the cop said.

Another resident claimed that gunmen were even demanding that they hide them in their houses when the police were raiding their area, opening them up to a charge of harbouring a wanted fugitive.

To be branded an informer is a death sentence and Campbell said this fact of life in the ghetto continued to seriously hamper police investigations.

“The police will get calls about who are the perpetrators of most crimes, but no one will come forward and give us statements so we can successfully build a case against these criminals,” Campbell said, his frustration obvious.

One man, who recently refused to join up with his neighbours to engage in a turf war with men from another section of a community in South St Andrew, had to run for his life after his house was torched by arsonists in the dead of night.

His pregnant spouse and four-year-old son were in the house at the time of the attack and he lost all his earthly possessions in the fire.

“All a wi grow up in the area and couple years ago some little boys start fire gun pan them one another. Man from up the road against man from down the road. Me know everybody and decide say me nah hold no vibes against no man.

The man dem from my area say me no fi chat wid the man dem down the road and true dem see me and one girl from down deh a chat them bun me out,” the man complained bitterly.

He has since gone into hiding after constant threats against his life.