The police have been put under immense pressure to rid Gregory Park in Portmore of the wave of crime now sweeping the area. Reports are that more than a dozen men with rifles went on a rampage early Saturday morning. A 58-year-old man was shot in his home.

‘GUNSHOT LIKE RICE GRAIN’

Gulf residents in Gregory Park under siege

20 Dec 2021

Ruddy Mathison/ Gleaner Writer

AN ONGOING rift between rival factions in the Gulf area of Gregory Park, St Catherine, has triggered new tensions in the crime-plagued community as residents blame the St Catherine South police and political representatives for taking sides in the conflict.

The friction reached crisis levels when a band of gunmen – estimated as numerous as 15 – armed with rifles surged into the area in the early hours of Saturday morning, firing shots indiscriminately.

A 58-year-old man sustained gunshot injuries as bullets pierced his two-room board house. A small shop was also set ablaze by the men before they left on foot.

A 48-hour curfew, commencing on Saturday at 6 p.m., was imposed for the police to restore some semblance of normality, but residents reported hearing gunshots overnight.

“We the residents feel that the police are taking sides in the conflict because we know that the boys are from Mexico, Christian Pen, and Clarks Avenue, and the police, instead of going into these areas, they target us,” a resident, speaking, like others, on condition of anonymity, said while getting overwhelming support from other householders.

“The curfew is unjustified because we are not the ones shooting at each other. Our place was shot up and a we the police after. It nuh mek no sense. We tired of this!”

REIGN OF TERROR

Another resident described the night of terror as she lay flat on the floor in fear that she might have been cut down in the torrent of bullets.

Her neighbour, who has an infant, reportedly forced the child to cry as gunmen tried her door in a bid to enter. She believes the action caused the attackers to abandon their quest.

“It worked because they left and went somewhere else,” the

resident told The Gleaner.

“Mi hear gunshot like rice grain. Mi nuh know wey dem get so much shots from,” said another resident, who is a self-professed youth organiser. He said that outreach programmes have been hobbled as social workers are fearful of visiting Gregory Park.

Senior Superintendent Christopher Phillips, commanding officer of the St Catherine South police, has denied the residents’ claims of police bias.

“We have been acting on intelligence and doing targeted operations in the area. The curfew now on in the area is a response to the intelligence. I am disappointed that the residents would say that because I have personally initiated meetings with the residents in Gulf to build relationships,” Phillips told The Gleaner.

Phillips is urging the residents of Gulf to turn in gangsters from the community and to supply the police with information.

Efforts to get a response from St Catherine East Central Member of Parliament Alando Terrelonge, within whose constituency Gregory Park falls, were unsuccessful.

 

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