Conger

The West Indies spiraling crime rate has prompted a Trinidad archdeacon to offer his services as a hangman.

In his sermon to the congregation of St. Stephen’s Anglican Church in Princes Town on Palm Sunday, the Ven. Edward Primus stated the murder last week of a woman and her two children was evidence of the moral collapse of society.

“Two children and their mother chopped to death. Hang him high! If they do not want to do it, I will! You have to fight fire with fire sometimes. My heart is bleeding. How many more must die before we act,” Archdeacon Primus told the congregation, according to Newsday.

Narcotics trafficking and gang violence has rising dramatically in the West Indies in the recent decade, and in 2008 Trinidad surpassed Jamaica as the region’s murder capital. Trinidad recorded 550 murders in 2008. In January the Home Office reported there were 772 murders in England and Wales committed in 2008.

Breaking the flow of narcotics north to America and weapons south to the Caribbean and Latin America will be one of the principal topics of discussion at the Fifth Summit of the Americas scheduled for April 17-19 in Port of Spain. US President Barack Obama will be asked by Caribbean leaders to stop the flow of small arms from the US into the region, which authorities believe has led to a tripling of the homicide rate over the past decade.

Individual states within the region have responded to the crime wave with a push towards harsher deterrence of crime. On Dec 19 the small island nation of St. Kitts and Nevis hanged Charles Laplance for the 2006 murder of his wife—the first execution in the West Indies since the execution of murderer David Mitchell in the Bahamas in 2000.

Since Mitchell’s hanging, there has been a de facto ban on capital punishment in the English-speaking Caribbean since a 2000 ruling by the Privy Council handed down after Mitchell’s execution. The Privy Council lengthened the appeals process for those convicted of capital crimes to approximately five years. The five year process effectively ended executions, as a separate law banned excessively long imprisonments for prisoners on death row.

Laplance was executed in St Kitts after his attorney failed to file a timely appeal of his sentence. In 2008 the murder rate in St. Kitts reached a level of 52 per100,000, making it one of the most deadliest countries in the world. The murder rate in the US was almost ten times less at 5.9 per 100,000 according to statistics released by the FBI while the rate in Britain was 1.37 per 100,000.

St. Kitts and Nevis prime minister Denzil Douglas told the Caribbean media the execution was necessary to establish a deterrent among the people for taking another’s life and that the government has “a resolve to deal with the issue of crime and violence in this country.” In November, the Jamaican parliament rejected a ban on capital punishment, with the Trinidad parliament following suit in February.

The region’s Anglican bishops, however, last year called for an end to capital punishment. In a pastoral letter released after the Nov 11-14 meeting, the bishops said it was understandable “the cry ‘to hang the perpetrators high’ [had] reached crescendo proportions,” adding that violent crime had “produced fear and a sense of impotence and hopelessness in our communities.”

However, “mindful of our Blessed Lord’s repudiation of ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,’ and, that in our prayer, study, reflection and experience, the death penalty has not been proved to be a deterrent, we, the bishops of the Church in the Province of the West Indies, meeting in Nassau in AD 2008, are of one mind in calling our people to stand with us in our opposition to the death penalty.”

A Kingston man convicted last month by a Jamaican court of the murder of an Anglican priest has been sentenced to 12 years in prison.

On Feb 3 Supreme Court Judge Norma McIntosh rejected 24-year old Prince Vale’s request for clemency and told the 24-year old Kingston man his plea of self-defence offered no mitigation for the murder.

A Jamaican jury on Jan 14 returned a verdict of manslaughter against Vale for the Nov 12, 2006 killing of the Rev. Richard Johnson, rector of St Andrew’s Church, Stone Hill. It rejected Vale’s claim that he had been propositioned by the vicar, and slashed him with his knife when the priest became violent after Vale refused his sexual advances. However, the jury declined to convict Vale of capital murder, which in Jamaica may lead to a hanging.

In her summing up, Judge McIntosh noted the defendant had admitted he had exchanged sexual favours for cash with the priest before the night of the murder, and that this “greed” had inexorably led to his downfall.

A Jamaican jury has returned a verdict of manslaughter against a Kingston man accused of murdering an Anglican priest, the Rev. Richard Johnson. On Jan 14 a jury rejected the prosecution’s claim of premeditated murder, and the defence’s contention of self-defense, finding that while 25 year old laborer Prince Vale may have been provoked and acted out of anger, he was nonetheless guilty of manslaughter.

On the evening of Nov 12, 2006 Vale stabbed the priest to death after an altercation at the rectory of St Andrew’s Church, Stone Hill. Vale was observed leaving the rectory and in a statement given to the police, admitted stabbing Fr. Johnson. Initial reports of the stabbing focused on the city’s high crime rate—and the case led to a public outcry for more vigorous policing.

Vale claimed to have been propositioned by the vicar, and slashed him with his knife when the priest became violent after Vale refused his sexual advances. However, in further testimony, Vale admitted that he had been intimate with the vicar on other occasions.

After the verdict was read, Vale broke down pleading for mercy from the judge before being taken away. Sentencing will take place on Feb 4.

Had he been convicted of capital murder, Vale most likely would have been hanged. In 2004 the Jamaican Court of Appeal abolished mandatory death sentences for capital murder, permitting judges to hand down life sentences or the death sentence.

Last year the Bishops of the Church of the Province of the West Indies entered the death penalty debate, urging its abolition across the Caribbean.

The death penalty is not the answer to the rising tide of violent crime plaguing the Caribbean, say the Bishops of the Church of the Province of the West Indies. Meeting in Nassau from Nov 11-14, the bishops said they were of “one mind in calling our people to stand with us in our opposition to the death penalty.”

After a hiatus of several years, Trinidad, Jamaica and other West Indian nations are seeking to reintroduce capital punishment in response to a crime wave fueled by drugs and gang warfare. In February, the Bishop of Trinidad noted that while Scripture provided a warrant for states to impose capital punishment, it was not the best solution.

Life imprisonment was the better option,” the Rt. Rev. Calvin Bess said, as “one of the major Christian pillars is the redemption of man.” No one was “beyond redemption” he argued, and “we cannot lose hope.”

The Nov 14 communiqué by the West Indian bishops is the church’s first formal statement on capital punishment. Given the unprecedented level of crime in the West Indies, it was understandable “the cry ‘to hang the perpetrators high’ [had] reached crescendo proportions,” adding that violent crime had “produced fear and a sense of impotence and hopelessness in our communities.”

However, “mindful of our Blessed Lord’s repudiation of ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,’ and, that in our prayer, study , reflection and experience, the death penalty has not been proved to be a deterrent, we, the bishops of the Church in the Province of the West Indies, meeting in Nassau in AD 2008, are of one mind in calling our people to stand with us in our opposition to the death penalty.”

Moral and social reform was the best way forward they argued. This would require the “ecumenical cooperation” of the Caribbean churches along with the “inter-disciplinary participation of the courts, the police and the social services in all steps in the process.”

The bishops urged governments to address the root causes of crime through legislation and social policies that would “effect the reduction of significant inequalities in the region.”

The Bishop of Trinidad has issued a call for the moral regeneration of the Caribbean island nation, which is in the midst of a gang and drugs fueled crime wave.

Gang violence had spawned an “enormous wave of terror” that had swept “across the landscape” Bishop Calvin Bess told the congregation of Port of Spain’s Holy Trinity Cathedral on Feb 17.  However the rise in youth crime was not only a failure of policing, but a collapse of the moral order.  “If life has no meaning” for criminals, “how can death have any meaning?” the bishop asked.

Trinidad and Tobago has seen an upsurge in crime over the past decade.  In 2000 the police service recorded 120 murders–a figure that had risen to 388 by the end of 2007.  Nine murders were committed on Jan 1.

Last month the government pledged a renewed effort to tackle the violence.  National Security Minister Martin Joseph told Parliament that British police were being sent to the twin-island nation to train the constabulary, and Prime Minister Patrick Manning said the government “would win the fight” against crime through the acquisition of sophisticated electronics hardware that would establish a “security blanket” around the nation.

However, opposition leaders and the media have urged a more vigorous response.  The “most critical issue facing the nation is gang violence,” the Sunday Guardian said on Jan 13, as many lived “in fear for their lives with no confidence in the capacity of police officers to bring any relief to the level of crime that is now a part of their way of life.”

“We have wept enough, suffered enough, far too many lives have been snuffed out.  I appeal to the youth of this land who are caught up in this culture of death to come out of the darkness,” Bishop Bess said.  “Your strength, your energy can be put to much better use.”

Improved policing was but part of the solution.  The Christian transformation of society was necessary so that those who had taken to a life of crime could be redeemed and reformed before they struck, the bishop said.

Church and government leaders in Guyana have called for calm following the murders of 11 people in the coastal village of Lusigan in the early morning hours of Jan 27.

The killings have provoked a crisis for the government of President Bharrat Jagdeo (pictured) and may heighten the already difficult relations between the country’s Black and Indian communities.

After creating a diversion by shooting up a police station, a large well-armed criminal gang selected the homes of five Indo-Guyanese families and slaughtered eleven people, including five children, wounding three others.

Calls by panicked neighbors to the police went unanswered during the 20 minute rampage. When police arrived an hour and a half after the shooting had stopped, they told the survivors they had delayed coming from fear of an ambush.

The police declined to speculate on the motive of the killers, who were identified as an Afro-Guyanese criminal gang. However, local newspapers reported the killings were designed to foster fear and to establish the gang’s control over the local community.

The Anglican Church in Guyana denounced the Lusignan murders as a “barbaric deed.” Bishop Randolph George noted the “outrage and bewilderment” left in the wake of the killings. However, he urged restraint and called for a re-commitment from all the members of the community towards building a new Guyana.

Racial tensions between the Indian community and the African community have plagued Guyana since independence from Britain. Emigration has taken its toll on the country as many middle class and educated Guyanese have left the country for Britain, the US or Canada—giving New York City a larger Guyanese population than Guyana.

Church and government critics note the Lusignan murders could mark a “tipping point” between what is seen as a corrupt and ineffective government and well-armed and confident criminal gangs.

In a joint statement issued with the US, Canadian and EU ambassadors, British High Commissioner Fraser Wheeler called for calm. Communal violence and retribution would not provide justice for the dead, and would undermine the country’s recent strides towards development.

The High Commissioner stated that body armour and other resources were on their way from Britain, and trainers to aid the police were to be in Guyana next month.

“As friends of Guyana,” the ambassadorial statement said, they remained “steadfast in their support and were optimistic that the atrocity was a challenge Guyana will overcome.”

The Bishop of Trinidad and Tobago has affirmed the government’s right to reinstitute the death penalty in that Caribbean country, but has urged it to consider other means of deterring crime.”

Life imprisonment is an option,” the Rt. Rev. Calvin Bess said, as “one of the major Christian pillars is the redemption of man.” No one was “beyond redemption” he argued, and “we cannot lose hope.”

Last week the Prime Minister of Trinidad Patrick Manning said the government would reintroduce hanging for those convicted of murder and treason. Trinidad and Tobago’s last execution was in 1999 when nine men were hanged for murder.

Of the 78 prisoners on death row, 15 have exhausted their appeal rights and can be executed. However, the government has commuted the death sentences of a number of prisoners in response to a 1994 Privy Council decision that set a five-year limit for execution from the time sentence was imposed.

In the case of Pratt & Morgan v. Jamaica, the Privy Council also ruled that the mandatory application of the death penalty was an abuse of law. However, an appeal by the governments of Jamaica, Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago led the Privy Council to reverse itself and permit mandatory death sentences.

Bishop Bess said the Church in the West Indies had not taken a formal position on the death penalty. The Church’s debates focused on fighting crime, rather than debating the morality of capital punishment, he told a Port of Spain newspaper.

Bishop Bess noted the Church’s formularies as well as Scripture gave a warrant for the state to execute criminals, he said, noting “I would have to argue that what I see in the New Testament suggests capital punishment is” permissible.

“When Jesus hung on his cross, there were two people executed with him, one on each side. And one of them realised his erring ways and asked for forgiveness. He was pardoned by Jesus of the crimes he had done but he was not spared the penalty,” he said.