Police Say Violent Crimes in the City Have Decreased

Sr. Supt. Chester Williams

There was another shooting in the city on Wednesday night, and with it come concerns that violence in the old capital is flaring up. It’s a valid concern because it doesn’t take much of a spark to set violence in the city’s hotspots blazing. But Regional Commander for Eastern Division South, Senior Superintendent Chester Williams says that it’s under control. He told News Five that all their statistics are pointing to a major reduction in crime in the south-side of Belize City. He credits that to a combination of factors.

Sr. Supt. Chester Williams, Regional Commander, Eastern Division South

“I am confident that it is working and I say so because the measurement is in the statistics. At the end of the month we normally do our crime analysis report and the report that we are getting based on statistics show that there has been a major reduction in crime. When we look at the Southside of this area, Southside was averaging something like four, five murder per month, for last month Southside Belize City only had one murder. For this month, September which is usually the most violent month in Belize we have not had a murder on Southside Belize City. So I feel confident that yes the intervention, the mediation that myself and my team have been doing coupled with the patrol that our officers have been doing, the lower ranks have been doing in these areas are working. The community policing done by the community police is also a contributing factor and that’s the reason why I have always said that the reduction in crime is as a result as the various combination of factors that the police has been doing on Southside have been proven to be working and what we intend to do is to see how best we could improve on that. Other than the mediation or the intervention that we do if we should get information or intelligence that there is something brewing in an area or a group I would normally bring the group in and we have small pocket intervention within those groups to see how we can neutralize things within them.”