World hears about Cayman’s gang violence
(CNS): One of the world’s largest news agencies has now picked up on the escalating gang violence that is plaguing the Cayman Islands. A short Associated Press news piece reports on the latest shooting, which took place in downtown George Town on Friday afternoon, literally yards from the offices of some of Cayman’s leading offshore businesses. The independent news agency is the oldest and one of the biggest news houses in the world, and according to its website, on any given day, more than half the world’s population sees news of some kind from AP. The stories are picked up by thousands of daily newspaper, radio, television, and online news providers across the globe.
At a time when Cayman is struggling to attract both inward investment and tourism to boost its revenue and lift the flagging domestic economy, the news article illustrates one of the many major concerns in the local community about the damage this continued and persistent escalation of violence is doing to the jurisdiction’s reputation.
The short piece reported on the four incidents on Grand Cayman involving firearms in less than twenty four hours, from Thursday evening in West Bay, where two men were injured in separate shooting incidents, and then on Friday afternoon, when a woman was shot while at a bar in Mary Street.
Category: Local News
As an American who has traveled to Cayman many times I would like to express my thoughts as to your gang violence. I read somewhere that it would be a bad idea to bring in troops or special police units to shut down the gangs. It was said that this would look bad to tourist. I must disagree, I would be much more likely to return if I felt there was some level of protection. You really have an advantage because you are a small island and if you had enough trained manpower you could put a big dent in the problem. Here in the states there’s lots of places to run and hide if the authorities are looking for you, but in Cayman not so much. I think the sooner you seek intervention the better, not addressing the problem will be the end of tourism in Cayman. So I hope something like this will take place.
I also think all of your police officers should be issued fire arms. It is just wrong to ask these officers to face these new dangers without protection
The crime situation is bad and I will be the first not to make an excuse for any crime or criminals. In searching on line I was only able to find one story about the increase of crime on the AP and this was from the Taiwan News online. Again I make no excuse for crime on this island as I know when I was growing up the worst crime was some one breaking the speed limit or shoplifting and later ganja. However, putting all things into its proper prespective the curent crimes can be contained easily if we work together with the police to do so. The rest of the world’s problems are their own, we must not try to blame them for what is happening here neither should we immulate them. Our focus should be to find the necessary measures to reduce crime and assist our people in leading a life of promise and hope. When we had less material possessions we were a more happy, friendly, contented and dignified society. Not long ago our happness were not measured by the abudance of our wealth but now it seems as if we have gotten the "Midas Touch" and is losing everything that was good and pure. "Native Caymanians" my heart is broken by what we have allowed to happen to our islands let us come back to our senses and stop the blame game and admit we allowed this to happen because of greed, we can still save what little we have left but we must let others see that we still have a culture, mores and norms lets first begin to teach our own that they become aware of their own identity and self worth; we never had a culture of violence that is what made us so great that everyone want to visit or live here. In less than 20 years we have over 100 nationalities living in harmony with each other that speaks volumes about about us. We were once our brother’s keeper let us return to being our brothers keepers and yes we loved our neighbours as God commanded us to.
What Cayman law enforcement needs is a new approach, since the tried and trusted methods (not clear what they are exactly) have not been working.
Recently read The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell and there was an interesting piece in there about how NY cops turned their city around. The idea was to start small, with graffiti and fare-beaters in the subway, now we can extrapolate that to speeding, littering, enforcing seat belt laws, stopping truancy and youngsters loitering around in town after school with no supervision (YouTube material some of the time). All these small changes are going to change the way the police is viewed – if you cannot get away with these small things, how could you expect to get away with the big stuff.
Oh and what about the road blocks? I have never been stopped, and I only see one in fifty cars being pulled over and how would they find a concealed firearm if they don’t actually pull over and inspect more people? A licensing sticker does not a good citizen make. I have also gotten out of parking tickets in GT without even trying, I was saying:"I’m sorry officer, I shouldn’t have parked there." and he let me off… that sort of attitude does not inspire faith in the men and women responsible for law and order.
A friend of mine told me recently that we have 21st century crime with 1950’s policing and it is so true. The bobby with the stick will not inspire fear in the hearts of these criminals like he or she should!
Lastly, I want to implore parents to do the right thing by their children. Talk to them, listen to them and know their friends. Starting small in this case also means instilling the same value system in the youth of today that the founding families of these islands, and those of us from where-ever who know right from wrong and good from bad and ripe from rotten, were raised with.
The massive increase in police numbers at that time probably had much more to do with New York crime reduction than zero tolerance policies.
I don’t feel sorry for Caymanians. What goes around comes around.
You should be sorry cause here is where your sorry ass ran to. What you need to do is zip that hole in your face and pack your bags and go back to your sorry town!!! Caymanians are good people and are well know for this. Unfortunately people like you and with your thinking came to our islands and have influence our young people in to thinking like you and them not caring for anyone else but themselves. That is not Caymanian. That kind of thinking my dear is foreign!!!
Influence the young people..come on, don’t they have a mind of their own. Where are their parents telling them right from wrong. That is the problem we keep blaming everyone else but ourselves for these problems.
You would think we are in Harlem, downtown Miami, with the way the "boys’" are conducting themselves.
No one said anything about foreigners working here? And I happen to believe that there are quite a few foreigners doing work here without a work permit… And even if a foreigner is granted a work permit because he/she has a ‘clean police record’ that doesn’t mean that he/she has never committed a crime- I have heard that police records can practically be bought in other countries. OR maybe if that person has committed a crime, who’s to say that they’d ever been caught? On the other hand, there is always a first for everything- all criminals ‘have never committed a crime’ at some point in their life.
And as far as no one seeing foreigners running around shooting each other… NO ONE SEES ANYONE running around shooting each other, as far as ‘convictions’ can tell.
Why not just have a look at the nationality of people being arrested? Simple. Bit of a kick in the butt too!
It is years of greed, corruption and bad parenting that has led to this generation of uneducated caymanian ganagsters with no regard for life or other peoples property.
Don’t blame the foreigners, the causes lays solely at your doorstep. If XXXX caymanian girls didn’t sleep around with the gangsters, they wouldn’t keep reproducing. Caymanian girls think it is cool to be Mothers whilst still in their teens, it’s even cooler if the Dad has shot somebody. Obviously the fathers don’t stick around and end up dead or in Northward, so the Mums can’t afford to bring up the kids and soon enough the cycle repeats and those kids go straight into a life or crime.
If more Caymanians practiced what they preached in terms of their ramming the bible down everybody elses throat but living their own lives in sin. We would not have such a greedy, corrupt, stupid and criminal society leeching off the rest of us working hard to make a living.
The Enforcement Officers need to get out and eradicate these gangs before they become any larger. With so many school children leaving without further education and time on their hands they will be the perfect ‘prey’ for those already involved. Some of them got involved in drugs from older ones meeting them and enticing them by offering money for the sale of these drugs now some are in possession of guns.
They need to clean up these areas where ‘everyone’ on the island is familiar with by now – they are always mentioned on the news when crimes are committed. Get the dogs searching every day until they find where the ‘hide-outs’ are!! If they need more dogs then get more!! The Officers need protection so get protection for them – for this little size island this is too ridiculous!! Immigration – find all those here illegally and get them off as quickly as possible. I haven’t heard about anyone being sent off in a long while and the figure was way up there in the hundreds. Stop wasting money and get something done!!
Protect our borders from illegal weapons, drugs, people – search all containers properly even if they belong to the biggest business man on the island or even anyone in high authority – no one is above the Law!!
I agree with the comment about utilizing more K9 units. I have been wondering why the K9 units are not sniffing every car as they sit there at a road block? Do you know these trained canines can sniff even the trace of drugs, ammunition and guns? If the dogs must be ‘leased’ from US police forces for a short while, why is this not being done? A few dogs will find loads more than an army of men. As well, as I wonder how much they are utilized at the ports of entry.
Let me help you with that one…. The reason is because they fired (against the law) their most productive and hardest working K9 officer because of the pathetic empire building small minded little jerks in our middle management, and commissioner ranks. They had one officer doing 70% of the work and protecting oficers being abused, and they did his legs, so XXX! them, you get what you create cayman! he says (and no I’m not him, I’m still in RCIPS but not stupid enough to subject myself to the same crap) that the truth will out, and there will be a lot of senior officers, senior public officials, politicians and immigration officers who will have no where to hide when his evidence is made public.. watch this enormous space…
It’s interesting that Cayman Compass makes it a daily duty to reprint the worst crime news from the Jamaican newspapers, despite having a choice of more pleasant beneficial stories to choose from. I have long given up trying to rationalise why The Compass thinks that they need to give Jamaica that extracoverage of crime stories, yet when it happens to the Cayman Islands, it is "at a time when Cayman is struggling to attract both inward investment and tourism to boost its revenue and lift the flagging domestic economy" resulting in damage " to the jurisdiction’s reputation".
We all need to be mindful of our actions and realise that we are in this world to be our brother’s keepers. Do unto others as you would like others do unto you. we should strive to live in love at all times .
Maybe it’s because we have a large Jamaican population here, and not only Jamaicans, but Caymanians and other nationalities that like to keep informed and updated with waht’s happening over there. I really don’t think that the Compass does it to be mean.. however, maybe since its called the Caymanian Compass, others might be happy if they were restricted local news?? We all know that bad news travels fast.
Do you all listen to yourselves ? Did the Premier introduce H1N1 as well, complain complain complain b****, moan, ….. get up and do something about it or go back to sleep!
I bet if the Police rounded up all these wanna be Gangsters and beat the living XXX out of them you all would be up in arms, "oh he’s my nephew", "oh they are so brutal", no wonder the more intelligent Caymanians stay out of politics..
And for humanity sake, please stop posting things liek you are all experts and know everything, please lets have some intelligent dialogue and nomore of this "ya see, I told you so..!" WHO ARE YOU?
Geez
Didthe Premier introduce H1N1 as well
I’m not sure. I read that H1N1 can cause some people to wheeze and as I recall the Premier has been reported as saying "Wheeze broke". – Does that count?
It was only a matter of time. And the first time a tourist becomes a victim expect to see departments of states issuing travelers alerts.
answer to ITS JUST A MATTER OF TIME. With all the crime in Jamaica over the decade of years tourist are still going there.
I think you miss the point. Our relatively crime free environment was the prime thing that Cayman had to offer and this is now gone. Jamaica has a great deal more to offer in terms of sightseeing and activities. In other words for many it is still worth the while.
tourists are victims of crime here very often! The difference is a lot of them have so much money they dont report the petty thefts or will will be leaving soon so dont report the crime.
OK Mr Premier, the "let’s just let anyone know" strategy has failed. When will YOU introduce legislation to DO SOMETHING about the crime that is destroying our country? When are YOU going to do something that will keep these criminals off our streets? When will YOU introduce legislation to double the minimum sentences for all violent crime? When will YOU introduce legislation to end parole for all violent crime and make it very difficult for persons who are charged with violent crimes to get bail which allows them back on the street to intimidate witnesses? When will YOU change the rules for the prison in order to make it a place that criminals fear? When will YOU ensure that the persons in prison are treated less like resort guests and more like those who are being punished?
I am sick and tired of your do nothing approach Mr. Premier. Either GET ON WITH IT or RESIGN!
When will you all wake up? This didnt just start yesterday, it all started years ago, I think it was 1996 , when the government of the day said , we do not have gangs in these Islands, they were in denial then, the PPM also in denial in their last year tenure, so here comes Mc.Keeva, he is supposed to play God and get us all out of the mess we are in and its all his fault. What about the attitude of the PPM, “only God almighty can stop us” and he did, Stop the haberdash, do something about it, stop following the PPM and their nit picking, they did nothing in their tenure, they are doing nothing now other than stirring you all up, beleiving that a march can change things, They did nothing before and I doubt if they will now either.
The only sensible legistation I see put in place is that 8ft wall I hear that he wants to build around his yard. It’s called PROTECT THY SELF.
This is only the tip of the iceberg folks for once this escalates our Tourism product will nose-dive even more and things will get tighter and tighter for making an honest living.Pity our Government is not more forthcoming with at least something for the public to be able to feel that more is being done to deal with our ever growing crime problem.
lets not worry about what the world thinks. tourists and business will still come.
other places are the same – look at jamaica – high murder rate but people still go to see their mountains, forests, waterfalls etc…
nothing to worry about my fellow caymanians, we will always draw tourists to our shores with an expensive product as long as we have our blowholes, hell and pirate caves!!
Hopefully this is a sarcastic post, although sometimes I never can tell just how stupid some people are.
Jamaica’s crime is focussed in and around Kingston mainly and very few tourists go there. Luckily the tourist areas are all hundreds of miles away, so the visitors feel safe knowing they are hundeds of miles from the gangs and shootings. Unfortunately in Cayman which is a tiny island, any gang violence is only a few miles away wherever you are.
The downtown shootings on Friday afternoon were less than a mile from where the cruiseships land.
Cayman’s tourist product is very limited. It’s expensive, it’s an ugly place, no scenry or natural landscape. The closest thing to a mountain is actually a trash heap. The locals are very unfriendly and there is very little to see and do. Contrast this with jamaica with many attractions, very friendly local people (XXXX).
To anonymous at 12:58 It is unfortunate that you took the bait :the post you responded to was apparently done by someone not liking Cayman or Jamaica very much ,but wants$ us to start bashing each others countries.
12:58,,,,,,,,,Hopefully you’re from the Tourist Resort Area of JA!!!! maybe you’d like to return and see Blue Mountain, the attractions and friendly people!!!!
LOL! So Caymanians are very unfriendly while Jamaicans are very friendly? Is that before or after they swipe your wallet, mug you or drive you off the road? Is that the same place where the locals were sharpening their machetes to deal with those a gay pride parade? Please. There is no one more nationalistic than a Jamaican, either within our outside Jamaica. You are obviously very grudgeful of Cayman.
It is a myth that the only serious crime in Jamaica is in and around Kingston. It is all over including in that famous tourist spot Montego Bay.
To inside job 09:02 Is this the most positive contribution that you can make ?You are obviously not a concerned Caymanian and I seriously doubt that you are posting from "inside" Cayman.
I bet Mr. Bush is not happy about this…oh well, the "truth shall set you free!"
It is our own **mn fault for not tacking this earlier. Community, Police, Government, and ALL citizens of this country, the time may be too late.
Great…
Yep. Maybe now the Premier Extraordinaire will heed the Opposition’s call for a national discussion on the crime situation and the development of a National Crime Prevention Strategy followed by the appointment of a Director of National Security. Maybe that’s why he spent the weekend in Cuba. Maybe he was interviewing security personnel. Just maybe.