Griffith to protesters: Don’t try to pressure me

Commissioner of Police Gary Griffith is warning the public not to “pressure” him after a series of protests were held in various parts of the country on Tuesday.

These protests were linked to the police shooting of three men – Joel Jacob, Israel Clinton and Noel Diamond – over the weekend.

At a press conference on Wednesday morning, Griffith said the public should allow the investigation into the incident to be thoroughly completed, instead of “holding this country to ransom” and attempting to “burn it down” in the name of justice.

“This reminds me so much of the days as a little boy where we would have these western movies and persons automatically wanted to be judge and jury and they would come up there with their pitchforks and fire and the rope and tell the sheriff, ‘You need to move to the side, we going to string him up immediately,'" Griffith said.

“I hope that those persons understand – please, do not try to pressure me to do something. I’m not going to budge, we’re going to let the system go through as it should be.”

He said he intends to have a “firm hand” when it comes to police being involved in any form of criminal activity, but reminded the public that justice is not instant and takes time.

“We are in a situation here where you’re looking at over a dozen police officers, and persons are telling me that we should fire everyone, suspend everyone immediately. Now, suppose there were 30 police officers in the operation, suppose there were 50, suppose there were 100. Am I to totally send everyone home and suspend them?

"We have a Police Complaints Authority. This is being thoroughly investigated. And with that investigation, we will ensure that if any police officer may have breached the regulations and abused his authority, that will be dealt with.”