MY week one article in April of this year detailed what a “wow“ moment is, and the fact that it doesn’t happen often is what makes it a wow moment.

We are now at the midpoint of the year. We have recorded 272 murders so far for the year, compared to 349 last year. By all accounts, if the murder rate stays as it is, we should finish the year well under 600 murders.

This may seem a lot to you. Any murder, even one murder, is too much. However, I have lived through a year, in 2009, where we topped 1,600. So I am not celebrating the men who died, but rather the hundreds who have been saved by the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) and the Jamaica Defence Force’s (JDF) leadership, hard work, and crime-fighting initiatives.

It’s hard to explain if you didn’t actually live it. There were desperate years when you fought for a reduction of even one murder in your division. I remember one year, as an act of desperation, I used to drive -during the time stipulated that murders occur from one volatile community in my division to another, hoping to create the impression that I was on the ground in them all, with the hope that this would intimidate the gang members to prevent murders.

It worked for a while, but as time went on I was wearing down my regular team members and was using anyone I could find. This led to a tactical error, which led to my vehicle being shot up on December 28 of the noted year.

In 2009, by the middle of the year, in my division I was looking at an average of 80 murders.

In 2026, at the middle of the year, I am deeply troubled that 14 murders have been committed in my division. Just look at that comparison!

It shows two things: One is that we are really doing something right, and two is maybe I can have none in one year.

It is possible that the St Andrew North Division had no murders for the first quarter. If Superintendent Randy Sweeney can do it, then we can do it as well. He has to just share some secrets with us.

We just have to accept “no murder”, as my commanding officer, Senior Superintendent Leighton Grey always says.

As a police officer, it is an amazing time in my career. I can actually focus on capturing the culprits who commit a handful of murders, rather than fighting to try to prevent dozens and dozens of murders. I can also focus on capturing rapists, robbers and scammers.

Whatever we are doing, we need to keep doing. The forces at work that try and demotivate the police force are the beneficiaries of the calamity and chaos. They must not be allowed to win.

Extortion is easy to force people to pay when mayhem reigns.

International human rights funding is generally directed to places where the State is experiencing a catastrophe. Minor crimes are generally ignored by the State when it is tied up fighting gun battles on the streets.

As I said in an earlier article, commerce is returning to the inner cities. Popular fast food outlets are appearing in former gang zones. The quality of life of inner-city residents is changing; there is a narrowing of the gap in the lifestyle of those victimised by gangs in the inner city, compared to the rest of us.

We could be moving back to what we were before 1974. Our inner cities could return to being cultural hubs that created Bob Marleys, Ken Boothes, and many other international ambassadors, rather than battlefields.

The impossible has happened. Spanish Town has been tamed. I honestly thought that could never happen.

Area Five, which includes the parish of St Catherine, northern St Andrew, and St Thomas, has been an incredible contributor to this reduction, reflecting a 43 per cent drop in murders for the first six months of the year.

The mystery is how is Assistant Commissioner of Police Howard Chambers, the Area Five commander, pulling this off? What strategies are he employing to get this reduction while he is creating history that will be studied by academics decades later?

I think one of his techniques is having the right people in the right places and responding with resources as threats emerge. He has an incredible staff.

I study St Catherine South crime as part of my job description. In my discussion with him he knows the content of every crime report generated. So I guess he is not sleeping either.

I have never called Senior Superintendent (SSP) Tomielee Chambers and asked for help and get any impression that it is too late for me to make that call. She’s literally answering the phone at 3:00 am.

Area Five CIB Chief Bruce Higgins is one of the most identifiable investigators in the country, and Intel Chief Deputy Superintendent of Police Dubrick Stevens is, hands down, the best intelligence officer I have ever known.

None of what is being done in Area Five is easy, nor should it be taken for granted. It is an example of what happens when you put the right people in the right positions, irrespective of their age.

SSP Hopton Nicholson as well as superintendents Camendo Thoms, Troyville Haughton, and Randy Sweeney are all young men who, in previous generations, would not have been given positions that they now have. Yet look at what they have accomplished.

You can generally see what type of commanding officer an officer will become by how he performs before he is the boss. When Supt Leighton Grey was an operations officer in charge of me years ago he would be the first person to come to my assistance irrespective of how much danger I was in.

When Supt Camendo Thoms led my team there was rarely a high-risk entry that he was not a part of, despite being shot very badly during a high-risk entry before joining my team.

Greatness shows from early, and it usually takes the form of allowing others to have the opportunity to show their competence.

Many years ago I was going for the most wanted man in Jamaica, and when I spoke to Kevin Blake, then a superintendent working in a non-geographical division, and informed him of my intelligence, he offered to send a team to act on the info.

I recall asking him if he would allow the team I served on to conduct the operation, and he trusted my unit with the responsibility. We got the job done, and the rest is history.

So you see the “wow” moment is in many ways a teaching moment as to how you choose people to get the job done, the type of latitude you allow them to try and succeed, and most importantly, the leadership you provide.

The 53 per cent decrease in homicides in the St Andrew South Police Division, led by SSP Damion Manderson, is an immeasurable accomplishment in any division.

But in respect of St Andrew South, with a history of bloodshed that would make a pirate blush, it is nothing short of unbelievable. And SSP Manderson is a relatively young man.

Let us celebrate our accomplishments in respect of the lives we have saved in the first half of 2026, even for a moment, as we take on the task of saving more lives over the next six months, hoping and dreaming of a day when we can celebrate a year of “no murders” at all.

Commissioner of Police Kevin Blake

Senior Superintendent of Police Damian Manderson.

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