CAYMAN ISLANDS -The money being spent on regional police forces only comes into focus once a year at budget time with little or no data on comparative performance in crime fighting and leadership. Some of the largest amounts per capita are spent in the smallest islands, many of which are awash in crime, distracting statistics and concerned politicians firing off faux positive press releases.
A realistic conclusion can be drawn from the law enforcement spend in the Caribbean not including prosecution costs, prosecution seminars and prosecutor travelling. One recent seminar in the Cayman Islands cost the DPP over US$60 thousand for a group pat on the back while merchants shiver behind security doors and cameras. One senior police officer in the Cayman Islands declared that crime was by timetable, obviously out of desperation, non-performance and well, ignorance. Maybe that is the deal in England.
Police Budget Spends
The approximate table below is frightening in the amounts and lack of results. Any other group head in any other government department or private sector job would have been terminated a long time ago.
Country Police Budget US$ Police Officers Per Citizen Spend US$
Cayman Islands 100 Million 375 1,000+
Turks and Caicos 34 Million 400 680
Islands
British Virgin 7 Million 240 230
Islands
Antigua 11 Million 350 110
Cayman is significant in the largest per capita budget, two helicopters, patrol boats and the smallest area to patrol.
Laughable in the land of the blind where the purse strings are held by a one eyed king.
To be fair, Antigua has about the same population as Cayman but also a defence force of the same approximate size and budget as their police.
Significantly, Antigua is in a crowded neighborhood that fosters the proliferation of crime. Perhaps both Cayman and TCI should import Antiguan police leadership.
As you go towards the larger islands like Jamaica, the government spends around US$100 per citizen. It is not that the Jamaicans are receiving a better deal on public safety, just economies of scale. Crowing about murder rates will not make people feel safer, actual safety will do that.
Cayman is only matched by the crime wave in Turks and Caicos with policemen being held with unlawful guns and ammunition at the airport. At least in TCI there was an arrest.
There have been several recent instances of mass killings in the Caribbean best described at:
https://sflcn.com/caribbean-mass-shootings-the-new-pandemic/
All of this must provoke thought in the seats of power to rethink crime prevention and law enforcement, the two, often, mutually exclusive sisters that require different skill sets. One of these is unable to summon up the necessary religious or commercial fervor or political support to seek real change from the annual payment for no new transformative policies.
Keeping a lid on things is not a viable option when money gets tight from conflicts in the outside world drawing close. For Cayman, a 250 prison population equates to US$400,000 each after all is said and done from start to finish. Take pause on that figure which could mean just 10% of the police budget would be a spend of US$40,000 per prisoner on diversion programs, employment, monitoring and other programs.
The wonderment is whether the recurring annual budget spend is merely to hold the hands of politicians and well to do citizens rather than attack the core problem in a convincing way. The police provide a neat target for politicians on crime suppression but as many experienced officers will tell you, this is about law enforcement not crime prevention.
Ask the merchants who dole out millions for security which ends up on the cost of goods.
An ounce of prevention and all that.
