June 7, 2001 – Police Commissioner Franz Christian Thursday put the "criminal element on notice that disregard for law and order will not be tolerated."
Surrounded by the top brass of the V.I.Police Department, Christian asked the community to pray for Officer Lennox Lettsome, who was critically wounded in a shootout Sunday on St. Thomas, as well as for the family of 17-year-old Asie Rogers, who was killed by a police officer, also Sunday night, on St. Croix. He also implored residents to "come forward" with information they may have about specific crimes.
Christian had called the 10 a.m. press conference to address what he described as the recent "spate of violent crime" in the territory.
Christian recently implemented several measures, including the formation of a multi-agency task force, to attack crime.
The task force, announced in a press release a few weeks ago, is made up of all government agencies with law-enforcement authority, he said, including, the Planning and Natural Resources and the Licensing and Consumer Affairs Departments, the Housing Authority and the Attorney General's Office. The primary function of the task force, he said, will be surveillance and information gathering to pass on to the police Major Crime unit.
Two recent murders on Garden Street, one in broad daylight and both uncomfortably close to All Saints Cathedral School, have raised community concern, resulting in beefed-up patrols in that area and the return of the bicycle patrol to Back Street. Territorial Police Chief José Garcia said he has been patrolling the area himself and will continue to do so to assure that patrols are in place.
Four weapons –- one described as a "tech nine machine gun" -– were recently recovered as a result of the stepped up patrols, according to Theodore Carty, the St. Thomas-St. John deputy police chief. Carty also said abandoned cars used to hide guns and drugs are being removed from the Garden Street area.
The deputy police chief on St. Croix, Novelle Francis, called policing the big island a "daunting task." The police force on St. Croix is busy "putting out small fires everywhere," he said. However, he noted, help is on the way in the form of 15 new Chevy Impalas, some of which are hitting the streets "as soon as tomorrow."
The efforts of a school security unit on St. Croix resulted in the recovery of four computers stolen from Central High School. Francis said three more were found in a stolen vehicle.
Surveillance cameras set up in the Strand Street area and the Boardwalk have been a deterrent to crime in those areas, and Christian said he is seeking funding to set up similar cameras on St. Thomas.
Another long-talked-about initiative -– island mapping, which would speed up response time in emergencies -– may be a reality soon, Garcia said.
He said he has been working with the Lieutenant Governor's Office and a company called Land Data to set up mapping system.
In the meantime, he said, "we are using landmarks."
On the positive side, Christian said police statistics show that the incidence of felony crime in the first seven months of this fiscal year is down over the same period in the previous one — by almost 7 percent on St. Thomas and more than 8 percent on St. Croix. He used figures from Oct. 1 to April 30 for comparison. However, rape has increased by 9.5 percent and arson is up by 1 percent, he said.
Police officials present at the conference, held in the commissioner's office at the Alexander Farrelly Criminal Justice Complex on St. Thomas, were Carty, Garcia, Capt. Al Donastorg, chief of Zone A Command and president of the Law Enforcement Supervisors Union, Bruce Hamlin, assistant commissioner of Police, and Elroy Raymo, president of the Police Benevolent Association. Attorney General Iver Stridiron also was there.
When asked if he would wish for any single thing to make his job easier, Christian replied that it would be "to put my officers on step [pay increases]."
A similar conference was to be held on St. John Thursday at 5 p.m.
