– Crime Chief

THE Guyana Police Force (GPF) is not in support of law enforcement officers who take lightly reports of domestic abuse meted out to either gender, said Crime Chief Paul Williams.

Williams made this clear at the University of Guyana (UG) on Friday during a report on the findings of a two-year domestic violence research conducted by Red Thread in collaboration with the US Department of State.

The project includes qualitative and quantitative data from five local communities: Lethem, Bartica, Anna Regina, La Parfaite Harmonie and Plaisance/Better Hope.

Reports coming out of these areas showed that in some communities such as Lethem (Region Nine), there is poor response from police officers with respect to domestic abuse.
Project monitors reported that, coupled with the challenge of getting domestic violence victims from the hinterland region to speak out, there is the negative effect of some police officers who are unskilled in dealing with the issue.

“They would sometimes shout at the victims of abuse and don’t know how to treat the families. They would actually cause the victims to think that they have committed some crime,” one project monitor said.
Another remarked: “(Some police officers) continue to treat sexual violence matters with no respect at all (for) the victims and their families. (They) treat the accused person far better than the victim.”

Following these revelations, several calls came from the audience for the GPF to pay close attention the country’s women who they say are dying every day due to domestic violence and society’s indifference.
Others called for attention to be placed not only on training officers but also on accountability and on the provision of counselling for officers who may be victims of abusive pasts or subject to present abusive conditions.

In response, Williams denounced the actions of law enforcement officials who take for granted cases of abuse and stated that the police must treat all persons who make reports equally, despite gender or sexual preference.
As the findings showed that there is an increase in applications for protection orders coming from men, Williams condemned officers who ridicule men who visit the station to report cases of abuse meted out to them.

“The force is not in support of the ways these ranks at any time or any stage behave unprofessionally to persons who come with domestic violence, child abuse or gender-based violence. We must respect people’s rights,” he said, later adding:

“Men are being abused. But some of the ranks because of their longstanding culture they don’t feel that men are being abused … they feel domestic violence rests solely on women so when men come, they’re laughing at the men … we have to see this thing on a general (basis) and treat every case the way it ought to be treated.”
As the GPF works on developing a modern evaluation mechanism, the Crime Chief encouraged citizens to report law enforcement officials who respond negatively to person in need of help.

“I would like to see people video them. Use your smart phones and video them when you go into the station and go to make complaints and they behave unprofessionally. Bring the evidence and we will deal with them.
“Because the policy is that there are guidelines and even if the rank at the front desk is not versatile in terms of dealing with the matter or the issue, it is that rank’s duty to go and inform the subordinate officer in charge,” he stressed.

In addition, Williams said that sub-division officers and commanders must make special effort to form partnerships with relevant authorities for domestic violence training.
Also present at the event was Acting Chief Magistrate Sherdel Isaacs-Marcus who called on the collective efforts of all stakeholders to curb the “national crisis” of domestic violence in the country.

Isaacs-Marcus related that the information received from the research will help to provide magistrates with feedback on their performance to address improvement measures to their approach to domestic violence.
She presented recent statistics from local magisterial districts which showed the total matters filed and domestic cases during the period of January-May 2018.

In East Demerara – there were 3,067 matters filed, of which 333 were domestic violence cases; in Essequibo – 3084 matters filed with 35 domestic violence cases; in Georgetown – 7,972 matters filed with 352 domestic violence cases and in Berbice- 1947 matters filed with 35 domestic violence cases.

Among her recommendations to these realities were more safe houses for domestic violence victims, specialised counselling for children, probation and welfare officers to service the courts, magistrates, police support and public awareness on domestic violence.