MONTEGO BAY, St James – Commissioner of Police Major General Antony Anderson has announced plans to establish a specialised police unit of specially trained officers to respond to violent crime in St James.

The police commissioner did not provide a timeline for the establishment of the specialised police unit, however, but revealed that it will be based at Montego Hills in the parish.

Earlier plans for ‘Specialised Operations West’ unit, he said, were interrupted by the novel coronavirus, but are now back on the table. “It is a process of getting perhaps 200 to 250 specialised, specially trained police officers, similar to what is in Kingston, similar to what persons saw, probably on social media, in Oakland. Our SWAT team here in St James [will] respond rapidly to evolving, emerging situations or ongoing situations,” Major General Anderson said.

He was speaking yesterday at the opening of the upgraded Mount Salem Police Station which was built by the Jamaica Social Investment Fund (JSIF) at a cost of approximately $47.6 million, with funding from the European Union (EU). It will serve 9,050 residents in Mount Salem and its surrounding areas.

The police station has private interview rooms and other amenities such as an armoury, waiting areas, public restrooms and parking.

Construction was undertaken as part of the build phase of the Zone of Special Operations (ZOSO), now in place in the community, and is in keeping with the thrust by the Ministry of National Security to rehabilitate police stations across the island.

JSIF has been managing the social intervention aspect of the ZOSO, which was instituted in Mount Salem in September 2017.

Prime Minister Andrew Holness, meanwhile, said construction of the police station within eight months is a sign of improvement in the speed of public sector.

“I am certain, Ambassador (Marianne) Van Steen, that you are satisfied that the resources provided to support this from the European Union [were] wisely spent and [were] efficiently used,” stated the prime minister.

Van Steen, the EU ambassador to Jamaica, was very impressed with the speed at which the facility was completed.

“It has been very fast! I must say I am very impressed that a couple of months to see that building standing there where there was nothing six, seven months ago,” Van Steen remarked.