Media not reporting statistics on reduction in murders, says UWI professor

Monday, December 15, 2014 | 10:55 AM    

MONTEGO BAY, Jamaica — Member of the National Partnership Council, Professor Alvin Wint, has expressed concern with the manner in which crime statistics are being reported by the media.

“There is very little recording in the media that there has been progress [reduction of murders],” the University of the West Indies (UWI) professor said.

Intentional homicide statistics presented by the group has shown a marked decline in murders since 2009, which had recorded the highest figure of 1,683 within the past 11 years.

To date, the year 2003 has recorded the lowest count of 975 murders.

The homicide statistics has also shown that up to Thursday, December 5, there was a total of 930 murders since the start of this year.

According to Professor Wint, the media has continually highlighted that the country may not meet its target of under 1000 murders for this year, while at the same time has not focused on the fact that there has been a marked reduction over the past few years.

“The media report that I hear is that we might not get to less than the fewer than 1,000 murders for this year, and that’s true. We might not, but I think that report should also be accompanied by the fact that we have seen a significant decline over the last years,” said Professor Wint.

He argued that a balanced perspective is needed in order not to frustrate those who are working on seeing some progress.

“We need to have a balance perspective on this, otherwise it is going to be very frustrating for those who are working very hard to see some progress in the country,” he stressed.

Professor Wint was addressing a parish consultation on the Partnership For Jamaica (PFJ) agreement which was held at the Sunset Beach Resort and Spa in Montego Bay St James on Thursday.

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Media not reporting statistics on reduction in murders, says UWI professor

More gruesome murders in Trinidad & Tobago

The latest murder count in Trinidad & Tobago has put the total at 187 since the start of the year.

The Trinidad Guardian newspaper reported on Monday that there were four more killings in the last 24 hours, underlining the growing concerns of law abiding citizens of that country.

Two of those killed were brothers – nine-year-old Jadel Holder and 15 year old Jamal Brathwaite. They were both ordered to lie on the ground before being shot in the head on Sunday.

Then on Monday, in south Trinidad, 41 year-old Roopchand Harripersad of De Verteuil St, Lambert Village, San Fernando, was found dead around 8 a.m. He had a single gunshot wound to the head. Earlier, 17-year-old Michael Miguel, was found dead in Claxton Bay.

Roopchand had been released from jail about two weeks ago, and was well known to the police.

The newspaper reports that on Sunday, in the community of Morvant, the two brothers, aged nine and 15, were killed and their teenage cousin wounded in a gang-related incident at their home. Teenager Jamal Brathwaite and his brother Jadel Holder had just had lunch at their mother’s home at Petunia Avenue, Coconut Drive, around 3 pm when two gunmen raided the small-two storey duplex and executed them.

Trouble makers

Meanwhile, in other media reports, the police have been describing the two siblings who were executed as trouble-makers who had been involved in gang related activities.

Investigators said, despite his age, Brathwaite was well known to police, who suspect he had recently been initiated into the gang which operates in his community. He was also a suspect in several recent shootings in the Morvant area on the outskirts of the capital. 

Residents said Brathwaite had dropped out of school at the primary school level, while the nine-year-old is reported to have been a follower of his elder brother.

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More gruesome murders in Trinidad & Tobago

Bahamas PM says Cabinet will discuss new anti-crime initiative following weekend murders

NASSAU, Bahamas (CMC) – Bahamas Prime Minister Perry Christie says his government will seek to “escalate the war on crime” after gunmen over the weekend shot and killed four people during a drive-by shooting.

Prime Minister Christie in a statement following the incident on Friday night, said that he and his Cabinet colleagues were “deeply distressed by the horri?c events” and the recent incidents of violent crime in the country, generally. “We must all join in a collective effort to beat back and bury this terrible scourge upon our land once and for all,” he said, noting that following talks with Police Commissioner Ellison Greenslade, Cabinet would be meeting later on Monday “to strengthen and escalate the war on crime so that peace and a sense of security can be restored to our streets, our communities, and homes in the shortest possible time. Nothing is more fundamental than this. “The Bahamian people should feel assured, therefore, that my colleagues and I are absolutely resolute in our collective determination to bring crime ?rmly under control,” he said, noting that he had intended to use the cabinet meeting to formalize the deal reached with the British owned telecommunications giant, Cable and Wireless.“However, I have determined that nothing should distract us at this particular moment in time from the urgent need to escalate the war on crime. Accordingly, this crime-?ghting imperative will be the singular focus of Cabinet,” Christie said, adding that Cable & Wireless has agreed that “we should postpone the formalization of the new deal until January”.He said following the Cabinet meeting, he would be making a further statement outlining the speci?c measures “that will be implemented to battle and defeat crime in our country”.Police were continuing their search for the gunmen responsible for the drive by shootings at Fox Hill.Police Commissioner Greenslade has assured citizens that law enforcement officials were working tirelessly to capture those responsible for the crime.“We have recovered the vehicle which we believe was on the scene and occupied by those bad persons who left death…we are asking the public at large…who will certainly receive information about this to please call us as soon as you can, help us to take these dangerous people from our communities so that they kill no one else,” he added.Meanwhile, police said that a number of people will appear in court on Monday on charges ranging from murder to possession of weapons.They also said that a 29 year-old man who staged an armed robbery at the home of the Deputy Prime Minister Philip Davis last month, will also be making a court appearance.

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Bahamas PM says Cabinet will discuss new anti-crime initiative following weekend murders

Bahamas PM says Cabinet will discuss new anti-crime initiative following weekend murders

NASSAU, Bahamas (CMC) – Bahamas Prime Minister Perry Christie says his government will seek to “escalate the war on crime” after gunmen over the weekend shot and killed four people during a drive-by shooting.

Prime Minister Christie in a statement following the incident on Friday night, said that he and his Cabinet colleagues were “deeply distressed by the horri?c events” and the recent incidents of violent crime in the country, generally. “We must all join in a collective effort to beat back and bury this terrible scourge upon our land once and for all,” he said, noting that following talks with Police Commissioner Ellison Greenslade, Cabinet would be meeting later on Monday “to strengthen and escalate the war on crime so that peace and a sense of security can be restored to our streets, our communities, and homes in the shortest possible time. Nothing is more fundamental than this. “The Bahamian people should feel assured, therefore, that my colleagues and I are absolutely resolute in our collective determination to bring crime ?rmly under control,” he said, noting that he had intended to use the cabinet meeting to formalize the deal reached with the British owned telecommunications giant, Cable and Wireless.“However, I have determined that nothing should distract us at this particular moment in time from the urgent need to escalate the war on crime. Accordingly, this crime-?ghting imperative will be the singular focus of Cabinet,” Christie said, adding that Cable & Wireless has agreed that “we should postpone the formalization of the new deal until January”.He said following the Cabinet meeting, he would be making a further statement outlining the speci?c measures “that will be implemented to battle and defeat crime in our country”.Police were continuing their search for the gunmen responsible for the drive by shootings at Fox Hill.Police Commissioner Greenslade has assured citizens that law enforcement officials were working tirelessly to capture those responsible for the crime.“We have recovered the vehicle which we believe was on the scene and occupied by those bad persons who left death…we are asking the public at large…who will certainly receive information about this to please call us as soon as you can, help us to take these dangerous people from our communities so that they kill no one else,” he added.Meanwhile, police said that a number of people will appear in court on Monday on charges ranging from murder to possession of weapons.They also said that a 29 year-old man who staged an armed robbery at the home of the Deputy Prime Minister Philip Davis last month, will also be making a court appearance.Like our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/jamaicaobserverFollow us on Twitter https://twitter.com/JamaicaObserver

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Bahamas PM says Cabinet will discuss new anti-crime initiative following weekend murders

Murders could follow maths law

13 August 2013 Last updated at 04:25 ET By Melissa Hogenboom Science reporter, BBC News The team says its approach describes how crime and poverty increase as the population grows A mathematical formula could predict how many murders will occur as the population in Brazil increases, say scientists.

The formula can also be applied to other factors such as unemployment and literacy, they claim.

Brazil is known to have extremely high murder rates, which the team argue could now be better anticipated.

The scientists say their work, published in journal Plos One, could one day help prevent crime.

Gang and drug violence are among the factors accounting for many of Brazil’s cities being classed as the most violent in the world.

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Unveiling relationships between crime and urban metrics can help to guide public policies”

End Quote Dr Haroldo Ribeiro State University of Maringa, Brazil Now a team has analysed data from Brazilian cities from the year 2000 and found that mathematical laws emerge when looking at how several factors – what they refer to as “urban metrics” – relate to each other.

Criminologists are less convinced and say statistics and formulas are too far removed from the social issues that affect crime.

Money problems

“We have shown that most of the indicators that we use to characterise cities – such as GDP, the number of illiterate, the number of unemployed – are closely related with the population of the cities,” said Haroldo Ribeiro, from the State University of Maringa, Brazil, one of the co-authors of the study.

“Usually, the indicators increase with the population size, following a well-defined mathematical law.”

Increasing murder rates in Brazil has led to many campaign groups protesting

He told BBC News that the same mathematical law can be applied to homicides as well as 11 other urban indicators, including cases of child labour.

However, it was hard to predict the most likely indicator for crime, added Dr Ribeiro, although he found that factors relating to money – such as unemployment and family income – had more influence on the number of homicides, something already well established by criminologists.

“While this work is not focused on preventing crime… I believe that unveiling relationships between crime and urban metrics can help to guide public policies towards more effective investments, and, consequently, to help prevent crime.”

Despite the problems Brazil is facing, Dr Ribeiro said his country was becoming better at tackling its crime problems. But he added that justice was very slow, which could keep spreading a “culture of impunity”.

Emotional triggers Police in Brazil frequently raid areas known to be high in crime such as its slums

Criminologist David Wilson of Birmingham City University, UK, said that although murders “do tend to be concentrated in parts of cities with low levels of income”, the idea that there was a mathematical formula related to population growth “entirely ignores” the emotional triggers – or “foreground factors” – that lead to crime.

“Murder is usually about the loss of face; it’s about young men in circumstances in which there’s some kind of conflict that results in one of those young men wanting to extract revenge.

“It’s about the foreground factors much more than the background factors – which this study looks at.

“This study doesn’t capture the phenomenon of murder. It’s such a complicated phenomenon based on emotion,” Prof Wilson told BBC News.

He added that statistical correlations could be found in many kinds of data “but that doesn’t prove cause and effect”.

But Luis Bettencourt of the Santa Fe Institute, US, who works with data from cities to analyse human behaviour, said the formula could be applied to other cities too.

“When you look at a city and want to characterise it in some way, the obvious one is population size. What’s interesting about crime is that the levels of homicides tend to increase on a per capita basis, the larger the city.

“The explanation is essentially that cities exist to promote social interaction. And crime is one such social interaction.”

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Murders could follow maths law