Dear Editor,

While we are not oblivious about the high risks the security forces face in a violent society, we as citizens must move beyond eyebrow raising and delve further into how some of these police killings have occurred.

While some of these dastardly criminals are beyond rehabilitation, it is the justice system that ultimately decides.

In my opinion, based on the number of police killings, it is now a trend. Is it now a policy in the security forces that all criminal suspects must be eliminated without facing the justice system? No country with safety indices such as those in Jamaica has so many police killings.

Some people will jump on this letter and label me as pro-criminal. This is far from being so. But the State cannot be as violent or more violent than the society itself.

The Independent Commission of Investigations (Indecom) report for 2025 revealed that there were 311 police killings, 46 per cent of the 673 of our citizens murdered by criminals. This is an extremely dangerous statistic.

If we, as a society, do not arrest the causative agents that breed criminals, long after I am gone, killings by the State will eventually surpass killings by common criminals.

Fernandez Smith

fgeesmith@yahoo.com