Blaming migrants

CRIME is complex. As a result, there is a lot of disagreement over what is required to combat it. What we do not need for sure, however, is inflammatory rhetoric – unsupported by evidence – suggesting one group should be singled out for policing over others. Effectively, this is what we got last week from Commissioner of Police Erla Harewood-Christopher.

Speaking at a media briefing on September 6, the top cop said there is a problem of migrants being involved in crime.

“We want to speak to the illegal migrants to let them know that we will be coming after them,” she said.

Ms Harewood-Christopher later claimed she was not referring to Venezuelans. However, it is difficult to see who else she was discussing. None have been more pre-eminent among migrant classes in recent years.

It is easy to see why many associate migration with criminality.

Migrants fall into a general class of people with socio-economic disadvantages. They have a harder time accessing employment, receive lower wages and are exploited. In the Venezuelan context, these individuals have fled substantial deprivation.

However, studies conducted all over the world, including here in Trinidad and Tobago, suggest illegal migrants have a lower rate of criminality than legal migrants and native-born citizens.

An analysis of official police statistics from 2016 to 2019, published last August and entitled Threats to Trinidad and Tobago’s Security: An Assessment of Venezuelan Immigrants’ Involvement in Crime, found the widespread belief migrants pose a special threat unwarranted.

“The increasing Venezuelan population in Trinidad and Tobago does not significantly affect local crime rates,” concluded the study’s author, Dr Malisa Neptune-Figaro, a lecturer of UWI’s Department of Behavioural Sciences.

In the years 2016-2019, the number of crimes per year by immigrant nationals was less than 500, according to data used in the document, sourced from the Crime and Problem Analysis Unit of the police.

More recently, a separate media report suggested the year 2021 saw 3,828 people charged with serious crimes, of which 574 were non-nationals and 39 were Venezuelans.

Such figures suggest the focus by the police on this group is disproportionate.

While a UN report in July pointed to worrying connections between Venezuelan crime syndicates and TT criminality, these murkier ties have not been properly quantified in terms of their overall impact on crime rates. In fact, even in such transnational crimes, local facilitators and front men are the actors, not foreigners.

At a time when all over the world there is political animus against migration, the commissioner’s rhetoric was ill-judged. More so when we consider the profound ways migration has shaped TT’s DNA and its diaspora.

Such careless remarks constitute yet another example of why public officials should be challenged to provide details to support their claims.