Baines addresses infighting, failures and low morale
(CNS): Commenting on Monday’s conviction of William Martinez-McLaughlin in the murder of Brian Rankine-Carter, Police Commissioner David Baines noted the criticisms in handling the evidence levelled at the RCIPS but blamed organisational failings within the service rather than individual officers. “I would be a poor leader if I sought to hang operational failings on individual heads,” Baines said. Speaking at his first community meeting, held on Cayman Brac Monday night (20 July), he also addressed internal factions within the RCIPS and low morale, and said his first job was to stabilize the force and stop the hemorrhaging of officers.
“Up until two years ago, this service was viewed the best in the Caribbean – but it has lost traction, it’s lost motivational leadership, and it’s lost some of its confidence,” Baines said. One glimmer of hope was that, like places he had worked in UK and across Europe, “I find fantastic people willing to put themselves in harms way and serve their community.”
“You don’t need me to tell you that the RCIPS has not enjoyed the best of publicity over the past two years. In fact we have become the story,” Baines said, noting that the suspension of his predecessor and a role series of temporary leaders “had not been particularly helpful” in developing strategies and bringing leadership and direction and commitment to serving the community.
The low morale was not surprising given that the RCIPS has become used to internalizing its problems, Baines said. “What it has lost sight of is what we’re here for, which is to be an outward facing, public relating and accessible police service to respond to the needs of our community. Instead of that you will have read in the media or seen on the news that there’s been different factions within the force that have been falling out with one another and … yet further alienating factions within the service itself.”
He said there were currently around 40 vacancies which represents 10% of the force across all areas of policing but predominantly neighborhood policing. The commissioner said he had spoken to Cabinet and the Portfolio of Internal Affairs about a commitment to get operational police officers “not just to respond to emergencies but to become the consistent, accessible, visible face in each of our communities – and I don’t mean just flashing by in a car.” He wants officers to be out on foot or on bicycle so that they start to develop the trust that the RCIPS has lost as an organization.
Baines said he had met with police staff and reminded them of what joins them rather than what separates them — “We wear the same uniform and we took the same oath” — and to stop falling out internally. “Do we know what’s causing distress in the communities? That’s what we should be addressing,” he said, adding, “It’s almost as if policing has become secondary to internal fighting.”
He said he needed to get on the twin track of stabilizing the force and build both identifiable neighbourhood policing an specialist units that are necessary to deal with most serious of crime.
Referring to the “horrendous murder of Mr Rankine” he said a whole host of issues surrounding policing failures had surfaced during the trial, not least the critical handling of exhibits. “It’s all right to ask what we are going to do about the failure of officers in those issues, but actually, organisationally, I think we failed those officers because we put them in impossible circumstances with the demands that we ask them to do with too few.”
Using the scenes of crime officers as an example, he said there were five officers but there should be four more. “We put them in impossible situations, going from job to job to job, and so they make mistakes,” the commissioner said, noting that one single event can be critical to the reputation of the force.
Moving on to the issue of public trust, or the lack of it, he said that right or wrong, there was the belief that if you call the police people will get to hear that you are an informant. He said he had not found an example of this but that was less important than the fact that people believed it.
Internally he had made it really clear that the public deserves their information to be secure and anyone who chooses to operate otherwise had no place in the service, and if it came to his attention, that officer would be dismissed. Otherwise, they would never get anyone to come forward to give the police their trust and the best information and get the most dangerous criminals off the street, he said.
In some of worst areas in Grand Cayman, such as hwere the murder of Omar Samuels took place in McField Lane in George Town, he said that there were six gunshots fired and 200 people in the area – and no one saw anything. “There is a lot of fear in that area and traditionally people don’t talk to police,” he said, and explained that where communities were so ingrained in their sense of fear then they had to look to other options.
In areas “where crime happens but people don’t talk”, he said alternative security could be supplied by, for example, better lighting and CCTV, so that when something bad happens they don’t have to rely on eye witnesses and could use technology to fill evidence gaps. “There may be issues with money but over the last five years there have been at least a dozen incidences where people have been shot, murdered and machetied and yet we still don’t have people coming forward.”
After the meeting, Baines told CNS that Operations Tempura and Cealt had been distractions to the primary role of the RCIPS, and what was needed was a refocusing of the officers on their primary duty of serving the community and upholding the law.
In the absence of leadership divisions within the RCIPS had developed and this had sometimes played out in the media. “If there is no means to address people’s grievances internally these will manifest in the media,” he said. “If we provide a venue to deal with grievances and address these concerns, I would not expect the continued use of the media to wash our dirty linen.”
The commissioner continued, “I have explained to my staff that provided I do my part to provide professional support to address staff issues I will take a dim view of those who seek to further their self interest over the interest of the force by publishing in the local media.”
Category: Headline News
Dear Anonymous,
Re your comment: I strongly hope that you are not employed by the RCIPS.
I am not a member of the RCIPS, but I am a member of a culturally aware Caymanian Society who has watched the decline in the RCIPS after the employment of an influx of officers from other jurisdictions with lower standards of living etc.
I am one of these said individuals who pay the salaries of these officers every month with the indirect taxation on everything I purchase whether it is tangible or intangible. SO I am entitled to make my comments and although you may find them prejudicial, the reality of the situation is that fundamentally we are a sinking ship if we continue on the path of hiring these officers who have no idea of our culture, environment or simply put don’t care to know either, except for the credit amount showing up in their bank accounts at the end of each month so that three quarters of it can be wired out the next day back home.
Whilst you may disagree with me suggesting that we import police officers from our mother country, this is in now pay proving that I am from said country and supporting these persons, I am a born and bred Caymanian who has followed the rapid destruction of the moral of the RCIPS with the Community simply because we have too many officers from other jurisdictions where high crime is a normal day occurrence for them and therefore they are desensitized to the needs of this country and its people.
Give me an RCIPS that I can 1. Trust 2. Appreciate 3. Corruption Free 4. Dedicated 5. Honest & Unbiased. Then you can tell me about being prejudice.
To the Commissioner Baines, please ask the Caymanian people if they would prefer UK officers or others from neighbouring jurisdictions, and I can assure you that you will hear their plea: Ask our Mother UK for help.
Cayman was fortunate on this occasion. The mistakes and oversights were not seized on by the jury to avoid making a difficult decision. Cayman is also fortunate in that there are still excellent officers with the RCIPS. They need to be recognised and deployed in the right areas. Malcolm Kay needs to brought back from the Brac and allowed to use his skills as an investigator to help stem the crime that has recently gripped the island.
Good old fashioned Northern guy will get this place ship shape in no time 😉
Let’s hope so anyway, things can’t really get much worse right now.
As soon as a tourist gets murdered that is the day Cayman says goodbye to one of its 2 money makers……of course, once tourism is gone the finance people won’t be far behind given that most of the big boys and girls are expats.
What will you do then Cayman?
Anyone for turtling next weekend?
Mr. Baines might not be the guy that many of you as Caymanians wanted for the job, but I hope you are behind him because with YOUR help things just might change for the better.
He is doing what no other Commissioner has ever done speaking out about it and try to address it. One commissioner once said when asked about Corruption in the Police service "That he came here and found it".
Commissioner Baines seems to be off to a good start and and has rightly taken the time to gain a good understanding of the "politics" of what he is dealing with within the RCIPS. With this approach there is a good chance that he can turn thing around and perhaps we will see the return of a more Caymanian based RCIPS, which is now greatly lacking.
Now he got himself a serious issue to deal with!