Cops vow to end wave of violence
In the wake of the violence that has dominated the streets of Belize City this week, today the police high command called for peace but vowed to bring those responsible to justice. According to Senior Superintendent of Police Chester Williams, too many young men have decided to settle scores with bullets instead of dialogue and the resulting mayhem has forced authorities to use all means to stop the bloodshed.
Sr. Supt. Chester Williams, Deputy Commander, Eastern Division
“I am certain that the Belizean public might be wondering what the police department is doing, or expect to in relations to the shootings that have been occurring around the city. And I must say that we are looking at these shootings very seriously. I believe that we have dialogued enough with these people, trying to give them the opportunity to change. And it’s time for us to stop dialogue and we need to go into some more swift and severe actions in dealing with them.”
“You will see the police presence, people will be complaining. However, we will not allow the complaints to distract us from doing our work. We will operate within the scope of the law in dealing with these people. It’s not a threat, dialogue time is over, we need to get down to business and be serious, and I’m damn serious about it! We need to send a message to them and we will send a message loud and clear. And as I said, we will operate within the scope of the law. We will not go out there and brutalize people or work as a criminal organisation. We are police officers; we will maintain professionalism in instituting our duties.”
“We have solicited some assistance from the Belize Defence Force and they will be utilized to join the police, so that we could stretch our human resources to a greater extent. We want to ensure that all the vulnerable areas within the city are covered by police officers. We want to have high police visibility likewise. And that in itself will be a form of deterrence to crime. We do not want to give one the opportunity to be shooting at another. We want to ensure that the police presence could be seen, almost at any street corner you turn you will see a police presence, either on foot or in vehicle.”
