The recent Sligoville gun battle between gunmen and members of our security forces, which claimed the lives of Corporal Trevoy Shaw and Constable Devoney Rose and injured a third police officer, is a very powerful reminder that we have in our midst benighted individuals who have no inhibitions about snuffing out the lives of those whose primary job is to protect law-abiding citizens in one of the most vile and dangerous policing environments globally.

The slaying of Corporal Trevoy Shaw and Constable Devoney Rose was a direct attack on the Jamaican State. The shooting of a 10-year-old girl who is said to be related to one of the deceased gunmen is itself evidence that the gunmen were not docile choir boys, as some would want us to believe. They were, instead, cold and heartless fiends, ready and evidently willing to descend to the lowest levels of human depravity in order to satisfy their rotten objective of profiting from the foulest misdeeds imaginable.

I have long advanced the view in this space that I do not believe that social powder puffs — or forms of emotional embrace — will soothe or silence the ravenous monsters among us whose vocation is rape, robbery, murder, and other heinous acts. And I continue to strongly maintain that those who are wedded to criminal mayhem must be hunted, captured, and put before the courts. As well, those who attack State personnel so as to endanger their lives and/or the lives of other law-abiding citizens must not be treated with kid gloves, since it is a matter of us or the criminals.

There are some among us, including individuals with very deep pockets, who profit from squalor, crime, and all kinds of human depravity. They have a vested interest in keeping those who are susceptible, trapped in a tight mental, economic, social, cultural, and political rathole. These vermin will stop at nothing to destroy this country. The choice is clear: It is them or us. There is no middle ground in the fight to rid Jamaica of those who make a living from crime. Those who believe they can ride with the security forces and simultaneously sup with criminals are worse than the biblical Judas. He at least went out and hanged himself when he discovered the great wrong he had done. The gunmen killed in Sligoville got their comeuppance.

ENABLERS OF CRIMINALS

Chairman of the Jamaica Police Federation Detective Sergeant Doris Stewart said on radio that Corporal Shaw and Constable Rose were both shot in the head. The gunmen meant to kill them. These gunmen and similarly barbarous and depraved individuals are the kinds of vermin that some among us hold near and dear. They are enablers of criminals.

Many of these enablers are sponsored by some in very high places who often speak on public platforms with a forked tongue. There are reams of findings in commissions of inquiry and related studies which pinpoint with irrefutable evidence the closer-than-a-brother historical and especially political linkage between gunmen and some in ‘high society’. I don’t believe that the umbilical cord has been completely severed to date.

It has not escaped my notice that some who describe themselves as human rights activists, but are really criminal rights lobbyists, have embraced a stony silence since the Sligoville gun battle. They are a cheap joke masquerading as public scrutiny. All well-thinking Jamaicans must cease pandering to these puppets. Some receive funding from near and far. Some of these criminal rights crusaders wear bright shiny robes and some are well credentialled. These are confidence tricksters. Well-meaning folk must shun them and their sophistry at every opportunity.

It seemingly does not matter to them that the vast majority of Jamaicans do not live in gated communities. Most Jamaicans cannot afford to hire private security companies, do not have licensed firearms, cannot afford ferocious guard dogs, do not own high-tech cameras, and do not earn disposable incomes to purchase even low-tech security devices to protect person and property.

Many of those who mollycoddle criminals live in gated and well-heeled communities where gunmen think once, twice, and thrice before attempting to invade. Why? The vermin know that individuals in those environs have proportionate and/or superior means to repel them.

Always keep a sharp eye on those around you who are not happy for your happiness. A similar principle is applicable to people nationally who are sorely disappointed when Jamaica achieves major socio-economic advances. These are the kinds of people who are quite prepared to ride on the coffins of Jamaicans if it will feather their individual nests.

It has not escaped my notice that some, in their sordid effort to try to de-legitimise, diminish, and minimise the historic 23 per cent decline in murders to date, have repeatedly intimated that the 311 police fatal shootings in 2025 should be added to the 673 murders last year, and that the 242 police fatal shootings this year should be added to the 439 murders to date. That fuzzy mathematics, they argue, would give the real picture of the state of murders. This is putrid desperation by mercenaries.

Police Commissioner Dr Kevin Blake says that far more people are arrested by the police than are killed. He notes that “thousands of suspects are taken into custody each year without injury or loss of life”. Enablers of dead cats know this but keep a stony silence. Why? Among other things, any admission would likely resurrect their dead or dying consciences and consciousness and also ‘stop their food’ (financial ruin), as we say locally. Reality!

FOES NOT FRIENDS

Criminals are not friends of Jamaica. And their confederates are not friends of Jamaica either. These are enemies of the State. Those who unceasingly campaign to make Jamaica safe for criminals must not be allowed to derail the most critical function of the State — the promotion of happiness and the preservation of life by vigorously guarding against attacks by internal and external predators. It is them or us. There is no in-between.

While the Administration continues to be tough on crime and the causes of crime, all well-thinking Jamaicans need to join the fight against criminals. Those who refuse to join this good fight are merely setting up everyone to become prey. Criminals are loyal only to the preservation of their loot and lives. The Sligoville gun battle is a reminder of this fact. Victims and potential victims are enemies and/or tools to criminals. Those who fool themselves otherwise are playing with very venomous snakes. It is only a matter of time before they get bitten. Then it will be far too late to utter the popular local refrain, “If mi did know.” You have been warned!

WRETCHED HIRELINGS

While well-thinking Jamaicans were commiserating with the police because of the slaying of Corporal Shaw and Constable Rose, others who are working hard to be and remain popular with criminals were rejoicing at the tragic death of the two policemen and the injuring of another. Jamaicans who mean this country well recognise that the security forces confront dreadful and deadly circumstances daily. The security personnel who sacrificed their lives and/or were injured at Sligoville were not off on a frolic of their own. The members of the security forces were in Sligoville protecting law-abiding citizens and safeguarding the rule of law.

Some do not want the rule of law to prevail. They work for conditions that resemble those in the film Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. They want life in Jamaica to be like that described in Leviathan, the book by the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes. Why? They believe this is their route to the acquisition of power, especially State power.

Life is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short,” as described in Hobbes’ book. Some of the vermin who rejoiced and are still rejoicing do not live in Jamaica. Some live in First-World countries where the rule of law is king. In those countries those reprobates studiously obey the law and comply with related social conventions. For example, many of them queue as required. They pay their taxes on time. They abide by the rules of the road. They give their biometric information as requested. They arrive for work on time. They do not litter. They clean up after their pets. They try hard not to disturb their neighbours. But in relation to the land of their birth, these same individuals adopt the persona of traitorous wretches. They spew acceptance of the lowest common denominator for Jamaicans who live in Jamaica. Why? They have been poisoned by a politics that preaches the retention and acquisition of especially State power by any means necessary. Many of these traitors are hirelings. They are gassed up and given talking points. Some of their puppet masters have long pockets, gilded academic credentials, prestigious titles, and name recognition.

These hirelings, their confederates, and the puppet masters must not be allowed to turn Jamaica into social, economic and political ashes. Well-thinking Jamaicans must exercise courage in the midst of the battle to save the soul of Jamaica. The louder the traitors scream and spew defeatism, depravity, and poison arrows of underdevelopment, the better we must become at drowning out and discrediting them. Their putrid contrails must be erased. The scoundrels must be held accountable, whether they are on local or foreign soil.

The State needs to cease pandering to criminal rights activists camouflaged as human rights crusaders. Cheap jokes masquerading as public scrutiny must be treated with a pound of salt. The State must put far more emphasis on the promotion of individuals who have demonstrated that meaningful improvement of people’s lives is their priority and simultaneously side-eye those who are obsessed with merely winning ideological battles.

AN INFLECTION POINT

The slaying of Corporal Trevoy Shaw and Constable Devoney Rose must not be another nine-day wonder. It must instead become an inflection point for well-thinking Jamaicans, home and abroad.

I stand with the security forces. I anticipate some are going to say, “But the security forces have some very bad people within their ranks.” True! So what is to be done: Condemn the two groups because of the bad apples among them? No! The answer, as I see it, is to strengthen the internal systems within the security forces to performance-manage the bad apples out.

Understand this: I would rather take my chances with the members of the security forces any day, as imperfect as they are. The choice is clear! All well-thinking Jamaicans must continue the fight against criminals and their enablers, near and far. Investing in the protection of criminals is a zero-sum game with generational consequences. You have been warned!

Garfield Higgins is an educator and journalist. Send comments to the Jamaica Observer or higgins160@yahoo.com.