FALMOUTH, Trelawny — Children’s Advocate Diahann Gordon Harrison says her office is concerned over reports of increased involvement of students, particularly in schools across western Jamaica, in lotto scamming.

“We have heard it, particularly in the west, that this is something that continues, particularly among boys, to be an issue that they are flirting with very heavily. So it’s very concerning for us,” the children’s advocate expressed.

She noted that deans of discipline are now complaining that the illicit activity, which is rampant in many communities, are now spilling over into schools.

“We have seen deans of discipline, for example, concerned about the fact that what’s happening in the community is now coming into the schools because you know, they (students involved in scamming) go to school part time sometimes and so that influence now exposes other children who are in that school community to these realities which continues to be a concern for us,” Gordon Harrison said.

She was speaking to the Jamaica Observer West during coffee break on the second day of the two-day Child Abuse Guidelines Training seminar for members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force and justices of the peace, organised and facilitated by the Office of the Children’s Advocate at the Royalton Luxury Resort in Trelawny on Tuesday.

Earlier during the ceremony, Justice Minister Delroy Chuck bemoaned that lotto scamming is becoming so deep-rooted that students in some western Jamaica schools have no qualms in expressing their ambition to become scammers.

“When you go in western Jamaica schools and you ask the children, what would you like to become, amazingly they have no pretensions, they put up their hands ‘scammer!’ Obviously, these children are learning what they see,” said Chuck.

He underscored that as a result of the lack of parental guidance, some youngsters have turned to criminality, including scamming.

“Let me emphasise there are young children growing up who, because of inattention, lack of care, that they fall by the wayside,” Chuck told the gathering of cops and justices of the peace.

“And by the time they become teenagers, they become not only deviant, but delinquent. And again, then they are exposed in these inner-city communities to a wide range of criminality. So these communities are learning how to engage not only in violence, but also in fraud, scamming. And that is why I can tell you the Government of Jamaica is working very closely with the US authorities to weed out the scammers.”

Assistant Commissioner of Police Clifford Chambers, commander for the Area One Police Division, told the Observer West that in recent weeks the police have revved up anti-lottery scam operations across the area, which encompasses the parishes of Trelawny, St James, Hanover and Westmoreland.

He said that not only lottery scamming activities are targeted during the intensified drive, but other forms of criminality.

“We are in an intensified mode now. Coming out of this intensification, we were able to make some significant arrests over the past two weeks. We have made some seizures and the drive will continue,” ACP Chambers stressed.

“Because of this drive, we have also recovered guns. What we have to understand is that there is an intricate link between scammers and hardcore criminals themselves, and the gangs themselves. So there is that link between all of them. So when we say focus on scamming, whilst we are looking at those who are directly involved in lottery scamming activities, we are seeing other relationships between them and other gangsters who are members of hardcore gangs or who are toting guns, or who are literally killing people.”

In the meantime, Gordon Harrison expressed that more and more children in western Jamaica are being featured in crime either as perpetrator or victims.

“I can’t say at this point on the spot comparatively, but we do have figures to support that children in the west are not only featuring as victims of exploitation and crime, but they are also featuring as perpetrators. And so when you have children featuring within police statistics as being in contact with the justice system whether because they are accused of doing something or they are victims, it means that there are problems,” she argued.

“And so the Office of the Children’s Advocate has actually finalised a list of different schools and communities that we will be getting into, particularly during May which is Child’s Month. We will start then, and we will continue to really see on the ground solutions that can be implemented.”