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Commissioner of Police (Ag) Erwin Boyce (centre), with Deputy Commissioner (Ag) Oral Williams and Acting Deputy Police Commissioner Oral Williams (left) and Assistant Commissioner (Operations) Sylvester Louis.

Top Cop shares crime stats

WHILE there has been a decrease in crime this year over the same period last year, the top brass of the Royal Barbados Police Force (RBPF) is calling on Barbadians to remain vigilant and to report any criminal activity to the authorities.

The call was made yesterday during a “Talk Back” session between members of the media and the RBPF at Police headquarters on Roebuck Street.

Commissioner of Police (Ag) Erwin Boyce told the media that Barbadians must at all times be able to enjoy their freedoms anytime of the day, stressing that there must be no room for lawlessness or disorder in communities across the island.

Giving provisional data up to November 10 of 2018, he reported that there has been a decrease of 102 crimes over the same period last year.

“The crime mix of offences remains predominately as offences against the person and offenses against property. From that mix we have seen decreases in what we call major crime – murder, rape, robbery, aggravated burglary, theft from the person and commercial burglaries.”

He noted that in the case of murders, that to date has decreased by four, when compared with the 2017 figure of 28 murders. Additionally, robberies were reduced by two and aggravated burglaries by seven. It was also reported that other crimes are showing a three per cent decrease when compared to the same period in 2017. “That is, if you look at drug-related crimes and assault with intent; assault occasioning actual body harm, we are seeing figures, from 5 349 in 2018 to 5 551 in 2017.

Commissioner Boyce noted that in our effort to rid Barbados of illegal firearms, so far d 66 firearms have been recovered, which he stressed is provisional since there was some success in the recovery of firearms last week.

“In relation to firearms-enabled crime, when we reflect on the stats for 2018, we note that the crime has shown a fairly large decrease and we are registering 166 firearms-enabled crime as compared with 245 for the period last year. And firearm-enabled crime includes murder, robbery, assault with intent to rob, aggravated burglary, endangering life and shootings with intent.

“Our stats for the period January to October 31, 2018 showed that we have charged 2 042 with 3823 offenses. Out of that total 1 782 males were charged with 3 438 offenses and 260 females with 385 offenses. Analysis shows that the age group between 20-29 accounted for 903 of those offenses and the age group between 30-39, 526 and over 40, 615,” Commissioner Boyce said.

When we look at the status of offenders we found that the first offenders accounted for 647, repeat 751 and that 632 were previously charged but for different offenses, he said.

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