MALVERN, St Elizabeth — Minister of National Security Peter Bunting and head of the Area 3 Police Division Derrick Cochrane have maintained that if citizens are more alert within their communities, they can help to bring down the number of crimes taking place in the society.

Cochrane — who is the assistant commissioner of police in the division that comprises Manchester, St Elizabeth and Clarendon — has touted the benefits of groups such as the neighbourhood watch.

“I want to encourage you to form a neighbourhood watch, business watch and farm watch. The empirical truth is, in areas where there is a neighbourhood watch, there is little or no crime. The neighourhood concept turns on the principle that members of communities should be closely knit [to protect] themselves from the effects of crime. By doing so, they work in tandem with the police. Crimes occur in communities and this is where it must be confronted and fought,” said Cochrane.

The senior cop was speaking in Malvern at the official opening of a new police station in the area recently.

Prior to moving into the new facility in May, police officers in Malvern had been working in cramped, makeshift circumstances since Hurricane Dean wrecked the old station and courthouse in 2007.

Member of Parliament for South East St Elizabeth Richard Parchment noted that car and goat stealing was on the rise in the Malvern area and urged residents to look out for each other.

“We have to be our neighbours’ keeper. The police cannot fight crime alone. Call me if you are afraid to call the police. Let them call me the informer. I want to help fight crime in South East St Elizabeth,” he told residents.

One police officer in the St Elizabeth Division said that some citizens justify their “non-action” by saying that they did not have credit on their phones to call, but there were many ways to reach the police.

Citizens can contact the police during emergencies at no cost at 119, 811 or Kingfish at 311.

Bunting complained that on too many occasions, the police get called in to intervene “after the fact”.

He said that the parishes of St Elizabeth and Manchester were especially prone to violence resulting from conflicts among people who know each other and less from organised criminal activity.

“We seem to be unable to resolve our conflicts through dialogue, through mediation, through whatever other appropriate social means. By the time the tracing start and three or four back and forth (of argument) and one side run out of verbal responses, then they draw for a stone, a machete, a knife and hopefully not, but oftentimes, as it becomes increasingly prevalent, a gun. That is how the argument gets ended and then that is when the police get called in to resolve the issue,” he said.

Bunting said that every individual and group within the society will have to show a commitment to crime prevention and reduction if improvements are to be seen.

“It is really time that we issue a call to action of the entire society. If it’s one thing that we should commit to and redouble our efforts to tackle in this our Jubilee year, it is bringing crime and violence within the shortest possible time down to first-world levels. I have taken that up as a call that I am almost evangelical about, because I believe that the citizens of this country and the children of the next generation deserve to come and see better,” he said.