Anderson labels Westmoreland gangsters ‘parasites’
Published:Wednesday | March 20, 2024 | 12:06 AMAlbert Ferguson/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
FORMER COMMISSIONER of Police Major General Antony Anderson has labelled as “parasites” criminal gangsters who are now terrorising law-abiding citizens in Grange Hill, Westmoreland.
Anderson, who demitted office on Monday, March 18, after a tour of duty spanning six years as head of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF), told residents at an impromptu stakeholder meeting, held at the Grange Hill High School last Friday, that they should not in any way believe that these criminals have their interest at heart.
“In the interest of getting at each other, they are quite willing to put everybody else at risk, so we must know who we are dealing with and not fantasise that somehow these people have any benefit whatsoever to the community. They are parasites, that’s what they are,” the former police commissioner said on his last visit to Westmoreland in that role.
“We will not allow them to take over your community,” Anderson said, pointing out that the JCF, now under the leadership of Dr Kevin Blake, has the capability and manpower to secure their safety.
He encouraged residents to continue providing information to the police on activities of these criminal gangsters, and not to believe that these “parasites” can offer them any form of protection.
“Things will flare up and they will start to shoot each other, and, unfortunately, the criminals who we have, they have no concern about anybody else,” Anderson cautioned.
He revealed that the problem with crime and violence in Westmoreland is being fuelled by four gangs fighting over the spoils of criminal activities, largely from lottery scamming.
Almost two weeks ago, some five murders took place in a 72-hour span as gangsters aligned to the resurgent King Valley Gang and members of the emerging Ants Posse Gang traded bullets in their feud over the spoils of criminal activities.
Suspension of classes
Those murders were quickly followed up with the suspension of classes at both the Grange Hill Primary and Grange Hill High schools last week, after reports surfaced that gangsters were planning to shoot up one of the schools in the stronghold of one of these gangs.
“We have four gangs that are at play here, and make no mistakes about it, these are the source of the problem,” Anderson declared, noting that when gangs dominate a community, the gang issue becomes a community issue; and because gangs are rivals of each other, communities become rivals to each other.
Morland Wilson, the first-term Jamaica Labour Party member of parliament for Westmoreland Western, who organised the stakeholder meeting in light of the surge in shootings and murders, says the gang conflict is preventing residents from socialising.
According to him, it is difficult to organise sporting events, including corner league football, in the parish, in particular Grange Hill, because of gang conflicts.
“I can tell you that attempts to set up corner league football games have been difficult, because members of various communities refuse to play with each other,” Wilson said, as he pressed home the strain that gangsters are having on residents in his constituency.