PEARNEL Charles Jr, a rising star in the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) Administration, yesterday felt the sting of a daring daylight robbery when thieves removed government documents, a wallet and computer bag from his Toyota Prado in Kingston.

Charles, who heads the super Ministry of Housing, Urban Renewal, Environment and Climate Change, was hit at a cruel moment as he commiserated with relatives grieving the loss of an uncle.

The minister’s car was parked outside his family’s nursing home in Russell Heights, St Andrew about 9:30 am, Charles confirmed. The robbers drove past the car in a Honda Stream, apparently to scope out the area and returned minutes later to smash a back window of the Prado, before escaping with his property.

Police, who were quickly on the scene, collected surveillance tapes from security cameras mounted on homes facing the roadway and were able to see the robbery in motion, a spokesman told the Jamaica Observer.

The importance of the government documents and the contents of the wallet taken from the vehicle were not immediately ascertained, but Charles said the incident demonstrated the importance of surveillance cameras being mounted all over Jamaica to catch lawbreakers.

“We have to take the burden off our police officers by resorting to technology more and more,” said the distraught Charles, a former junior minister for national security and current Member of Parliament for Clarendon South Eastern.

Charles, an attorney-at-law who is qualified to practise law in Jamaica and the United States of America, served as minister without portfolio in the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation before his current appointment. He was previously the minister of state in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade.