MONTEGO BAY, St James — Sub officer in charge of Granville Police Station, Detective Sergeant Chea Notice says all cops under his command are outfitted with body-worn cameras once going on patrol. The reassurance was given in response to a query raised about interaction between the police and residents, during a meeting at Granville Primary and Infant School on Monday night.

“One of the beauties about the Granville space now is that every officer who is going on duty is wearing a body camera,” Notice said as he addressed the Greater Granville Investment Round Table.

“We should see a change in terms of how the police interact with the public. Every officer that you see on patrol is wearing a body camera. It’s not ‘should be’, it is a must,” he added.

There have been sustained calls from sections of the society for wider use of body-worn cameras within the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF), and the clamour escalates with each fatal police shooting. Civil society has stressed the need for cameras to be worn by cops who go on planned operations. Recent controversial incidents include four men, including a father and son, being killed, on June 10 in an alleged shoot-out with the police at a quarry in the vicinity of the Retirement dumpsite, which falls within the Granville political division. On May 17 Latoya “Buju” Bulgin, who was behind the wheel of a vehicle used to transport people engaged in a protest over an earlier fatal police shooting, was also shot by a cop. That incident was caught on CCTV and Constable Andrew Wilson is now before the St James Circuit Court on a murder charge.

The leadership of the JCF has repeatedly said there is not an unlimited supply of cameras, and the focus would be on cops who most frequently engage with members of the public.

Asked during Monday’s meeting if the body cameras worn by his team will be turned on, Notice replied that once they interact with members of the public, they should be.

“We have put things in place to ensure that the public interaction policy is observed by all officers,” he assured.

“Once you are out there and you see a police officer without a body camera, that is a breach — and you can complain to me or to [head of the St James Police Division] Senior Superintendent Eron Samuels. It’s a very serious breach,” Notice added.

He also urged residents to provide names, badge and vehicle numbers of cops who behave unprofessionally. It is an issue, he said, that needs to be spoken about, even as the JCF provides training to improve the interaction between cops and community members.

“The Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) is a professional organisation and it has a lot of policies that govern the organisation. One of the policies is the Public Interaction Policy, and that policy is preached every morning, every evening when an officer is going out,” Notice explained.

“That is a part of every briefing when an officer is going out, and every morning or evening when a shift is going out a briefing is done,” he reiterated.