Securing The Inner City Strategically (STICS), the code name given by the Royal Bahamas Police Force (RBPF) in an attempt to lower crime and criminal activity within inner cities as their mandate, according to officer in charge of crime investigation, Assistant Superintendent of Police Clayton Fernander, who warned criminals that their criminal activities will no longer be tolerated.
During a walkabout yesterday in the inner city community of Meadow and West Street, Bain and Grants Town, ASP Fernander noted that the country is losing too many of the young men, hence the need for this major operation to suppress crime.
“As I mentioned last week that we will step up our operation and what you see is exactly what I spoke to,” ASP Fernander said.
“After analyzing a number of the recent crime trends with a number of shootings that are occurring in broad daylight within our communities.
“We live in these communities and these incidents continue to happen.
“We have stepped up our strategies. What we are doing here today, we are on foot. We are moving round in vehicles. We are walking in these communities. We are taking the whole shift into these communities to stay in there.
“We don’t want the prolific offenders believe that there is no law for them within the communities. They continue to sell drugs. They continue to just fire off shots, within the communities.
“Good people live in these areas and we have to ensure that they are safe, and we will not let a few handful of prolific offenders destroy this good country.”
ASP Fernander with more than 20 officers on the walk about said they will target areas known for criminality, specifically the sale of illegal substances.
“We have analyzed and we have mapped out all of our crime hot spots and we are spending time in there so if they want to hang out, they will hang out with us, officers, because we will no longer tolerate that,”ASP Fernander warned.
“We have the mobile station van, we are setting up. We have an eye in the sky. We have the drones that is a part of our intelligence strategy that we are moving through these areas that we consider to be hot spots.
“We will stay in these areas and continue to target those prolific offenders.
“If you are selling drugs, we will park the mobile van right in front of your residence to disrupt what is going on. We will stop your sales, and if we find drugs we will put you before the court. You will be charged.”
He also noted that while he wants the public to work hand-in-hand with the RBPF, he noted that some parents are not taking matters seriously when it comes to their child committing criminal acts.
“I believe the members of the public will hold hand with us in this fight. We cannot do it alone so we just encouraging members of the public to continue to hold hand with us,” he said.
“The question was asked in those recent homicides where we know that individuals were killed who had just been released on bail and monitored, the question was asked how could we save these individuals? What could we do? What should we tell them not to do when they are out?
“My suggestion to family members with their loved ones, that is their loved ones, I am not insensitive with respect to that, but if you know your son is involved in criminal activities you should not even stand bail for them.
“If you stand bail you have to let them know they have to limit their movements within the community. Most of the time when these individuals are arrested by the detectives and they are spoken to with respect to the crime, they will not tell you the whole truth and eventually they will get bail.”
ASP Fernander confirmed that these major operations will continue throughout New Providence, but said to tell exactly where they would target next will not happen.
However, he did tell reporters that they will see the end result.
