Since 2010 I have been in the practice of logging every murder committed in the St Catherine South Police Division in my diary and conducting an analysis of same.

It was part research and part investigative assistance to the primary investigators. I have always worked on the special squads and, therefore, cannot serve as an investigating officer for a murder.

That is totally and completely reserved for detectives assigned to the Criminal Investigative Branch (CIB).

I have the sad distinction of having analysed more than 1,200 murders in that 12-year period, all from my little neck of the woods.

I have a contemporary in Northern Ireland. Like me, he is analysing murders. In his case it is for his entire country — if you wish to call Northern Ireland a country. I call it an occupied territory of Ireland.

He has looked at all the murders in Northern Ireland since 2010 — a grand total of 257.

He mentioned to me recently that he may come and teach some courses in murder analysis in Jamaica.

Well, he seems to be a great guy and I would love to meet him, but I fail to see what he could teach us, having analysed so few murders compared to what we have here.

Remember the example I gave you about my analysis? Well, think about the crime analyst for the Major Investigative Division (MID) that looks at all murders of multiple victims. We should be the ones travelling to Ireland to teach them.

The first time I did overseas combat training my instructor was a 25-year veteran of a police force in Florida. He had been in four shootings in his career. He was a nice person who could certainly shoot.

However, back in 2004 in St Catherine, special squad members were shot at far more than four times in a year. How then does he become the expert at being under fire if our experience trumps his at these rates?

The reason I am bringing up the two noted examples is to demonstrate how little we think of the expertise we have gained from doing the impossible every day.

No other detective on the planet carries the workload of a Jamaican homicide investigator. No other operations personnel occupy high-risk zones with teams as small as ours for as many hours as they do. Yet we import foreigners to teach us.

Odd, isn’t it? To be an expert of our crime environment one must have significant experience with our type of crime and in an environment similar to ours.

Now, I have been trained by men who fought in Iraq, Eastern Europe, and even Washington.

However, what of the men who fought in the Tivoli incursion? Who can offer more to me with respect to assault instruction in a Jamaican environment?

The true risk of ignoring our experts is two-fold. Firstly, we face the risk of not getting the benefit of the best possible training relevant to our environment. Secondly, there is the risk of others realising the value of our experts and utilising them to our demise.

We are already seeing the impact of not treating our nurses right; we are losing them to other countries. Wait ’til the plunder of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF).

The bulk of our police officers earn less than US$1,000 per month. That is nothing for a foreign government to match.

Our officers work under conditions that are worse than most prisons overseas. Stealing them is going to be a cake walk.

We are losing teachers, tourism workers, and skilled workers to other countries. Many of these people were beneficiaries of a fully subsidised high school education and two-thirds subsidised tertiary level programmes.

Is this going to just be allowed to happen? Should we conveniently pretend the world is not going through a labour shortage? Or do we do something pre-emptively?

Has anyone considered what would result if the USA removed the restricted entry regime and just said they will take any Jamaican between the ages of 20 and 50? This could empty our country of an effective labour force and we would cease to exist.

Is this likely? No, but it is possible. Is the plunder of the JCF likely? Yes, it is.

What can we do?

We can find ways to pay the officers based on the supply and demand curve. In other words, pay them to stop them from leaving. Make being a cop an inviting job, with automatic access to obtain a private firearm permit, National Housing Trust housing schemes geared towards police ownership, and zero-interest car loans.

Sounds like a lot? Maybe, but picture Jamaica without the 12,000 police officers you now have! Picture the experts with 20 years of homicide investigation experience gone to Chicago because, trust me, they need help fast.

If the JCF becomes a force of 5,000, then we will have to import foreigners to police our country and we cannot pay them US$1,000 per month.

So do you want someone from a foreign country giving you orders?

We are now facing what Cuba has faced for 62 years — the reality of training people for free and not getting the use of them.

Are we willing to create barriers against exiting once you attend high school or college in Jamaica? That would be a difficult step for a government of this country, irrespective of the party.

However, it may one day determine the very future of our existence as a country.

Feedback: drjasonamckay@gleanerjm.com