SECURITY Minister Peter Bunting has stressed the importance of a partnership involving the police, the community, and the church in the fight against crime in Jamaica.

Speaking at an open-air church service at Nampriel in St James, following a peace march through the Granville and Pitfour communities on Sunday, Bunting said the tripartite collaboration is at the heart of the reduction in crime in the Granville Police Division.

Data presented at the service by officer in charge of the Granville Police Station, Sergeant Delroy Harriott, revealed that murders and other serious crimes in the division, comprised of 22 communities and some 23,000 residents, dropped from a high of 56 in 2010 to nine in 2014.

“You notice that you don’t see one police officer with an M16 or a ballistic helmet or the blue denim, because that, unfortunately, was that type of policing that communities had become accustomed to,” Minister Bunting said, while calling on the Granville community to take their message of peace and non-violence to other areas.

“What I am hoping is that Granville will not only consolidate the gains they have made, but to evangelise and carry your message to other communities in the wider St James that have not yet seen the success that you are seeing,” he said.

The minister also commended the church for “leaving the four walls of their sanctuaries” and taking the message of peace out into the communities.

More than 300 residents of Granville, Pitfour, Retirement and adjoining communities participated in the peace march.

— JIS