PCA: COMPLAINTS VS COPS ON THE RISE

THE Police Complaints Authority (PCA) has recorded an increase in the number of complaints made against police, including fatal police shootings.

PCA Director David West, giving a breakdown of the increasing number of fatal police shootings from 2019-2022, applauded the use of Tasers to make a suspect immobile, and recommended that more non-lethal weapons be used rather than guns.

“From January-December 2019, there were 32 fatal police shooting. From January-December 2020, there were 33, January-December 2021, 31, January to December 2022, 43 and for January-February 2023, there have been about eight or nine so far.”

West and Deputy Director of the Public Complaints Authority (PCA) Michelle Solomon-Baksh were guests on the Eye on Dependency programme on Radio 1.95.5 on Sunday.

Solomon-Baksh said for the period October 2021-September, 2022, four divisions had been red-flagged for the highest number of complaints – Central, Northern, Southern and Western – in that order.

Central recorded the highest number of complaints – 95 – for the period, compared to 76 the year before.

“Second in ranking was the northern division. For the last year, 2021-2022, there were 79 and the year before that was 76.”

The third ranker, the Southern Division, recorded a significant jump, with 72 complaints for the period under review, compared to 46 the previous year.

The Western Division also had a notable leap from 30 in the previous year to 67 complaints in 2021-2022

“These four divisions feature very frequently in terms of number of complains we get,” the deputy director said.

In terms of gender, she said 65 per cent of the complaints were made by men and 35 per cent by women.

While she attributed the increase in complaints to the ease of doing it electronically as more people were empowered by a greater trust in the PCA team, she could not discount the fact that there was a spike in three categories the PCA investigated.

“Criminal activity, the corruption and disciplinary misconduct. It would not be fair for me to discount that.”

West said since the beginning of his tenure as head of the PCA in 2014 to March 16, this year, there had been 4,100 complaints filed against police officers. He also observed a spike during the covid19 period.

He said 445 of those matters were sent to the Commissioner of Police (CoP) and some 149 to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) with recommendations for determination.

West explained that the matters included criminal offences related to police-involved shootings, misbehaviour in public office, shooting with intent, and for disciplinary offences: misbehaviour in public office, neglect of duty, unlawful or unnecessary exercise of authority.

Among the complaints under investigation, Solomon-Baksh said there were eight for human trafficking, of which three were still under investigation, two were being monitored as they were before the court, while two others had been sent to the CoP with recommendations.

When it comes to domestic violence, she said complaints had come from spouses, sisters, brothers and children of police officers about acts of abuse where a gun was pulled, threats were made to kill, physical violence in terms of assault or beating and sometimes sexual assault.

She said in proceeding with such investigations, the officer in question was investigated as well as his colleagues who may have chosen not to follow up on those reports.

In such cases, failure by the officers to investigate another officer can result in neglected-duty disciplinary charges.

The accused officer is sometimes referred for psychological support or counselling.