Q: Mr Williams, what would you do differently if you are confirmed as Commissioner of Police...do you want to answer that question now or later in this session?
A: (In a relaxed mood, elbows resting on a large mahogany desk in the conference room in his office at the Police Headquarters, Sackville Street, Port-of-Spain, Monday morning) Yes. I will answer that now. I will do exactly what I am doing, leading the police service successfully.
Successfully, do you honestly believe you are doing so at this time?
Successfully! Successfully! And it is important for somebody to check into the leadership of the TTPS since I took over in August 2012, and one of the things you would readily recognise is that 2013, 2014, 2015, and year-end figures are the three lowest annual total of serious crimes within the country and within the last 33 years.
Mr Commissioner, I am not being facetious, but do you include homicides as serious crime?
Yes. And when we speak of homicide that has not gone down the way that society is demanding and expects, including the TTPS, and we in the police service will want those figures to drop. Hypothetically, if you are walking down the road and a guy put a gun to your neck and snatches away your valuables, that’s a crime. Do you consider the traumatising effect that crime would have on you, your wife and family?
Mr Williams, hasn’t the homicide rate been a blemish on your stewardship even though you were able to reduce other segments of crime for which I think you ought to be congratulated, but…?
(Quickly responding and pulling himself up on his chair) Tell me which Commissioner of Police has not been confronted with homicides. So it’s a societal issue which we have not as a society effectively addressed.
Did you say we have not effectively addressed that issue?
Yes. I am saying that, yes. That’s why we have high homicide rates.
But Sir, you have been in the chair for some years now and still the country is plagued with homicides, some of them committed in the most gruesome and brutal instances. And I don’t think that people care about other serious crimes.
(Fired up over that question) They’re not? They’re not?! You are not seriously concerned, Mr Raphael, as to whether your wife or child were raped? You are not seriously concerned whether you are robbed on the streets? You are not seriously concerned whether your house is invaded by criminals and you and your entire family traumatised? You are not seriously concerned about those things?
Right, but?
The point is we trivialise the situation because we are only concerned with homicides. But every time something happens to citizens...or is it only when you are personally affected...
Mr Commissioner, I know that the police cannot predict what evil lurks in a man’s mind or heart but whenever a murder is committed, people are horror-struck and no doubt they would look to you, the chief, to ascertain what is taking place on an almost daily basis. And can you give any assurances…?
Well, it is not about assurances, it is to give you some analysis around homicide, and one of the things I can share with you is that in 2015, 81 per cent of those homicides were committed with the firearm...take firearms out of the mix. How many we remain with? And if you calculate 19 per cent of 420, what do you get?
And that is the reality in T&T, which is why since I took office you have heard me consistently, like one voice in the wilderness, emphasising the need for this country to ensure that we seal our borders from the illegal firearms entering our country.
(Clasped hands hand-cuffed style on the desk) But I want to continue on this homicide matter. Can I?
OK. Precisely what are you getting at?
Yes. In order for us to effectively address homicides it starts with preventing firearms from entering T&T and that is only the start, but we need to focus as a society on the young ones, the young people in this country who are sent in the wrong direction and which goes right back to the core institutions: the family, the church, schools, all of that amount to make this thing alright. Police are only one facet of this ongoing attack on the criminal element. It’s a work in progress, and we continue to work to ensure that this country is a safer place with the elimination of the violence and education, and the development of the young people.
Recently, Mr Williams, you publicly observed that we are a violent society?
(Interrupting before the question was complete) Would you agree with me? Would you agree with me? Would you agree with me? (Voice slightly raised) When 420 people are murdered in a country with just about 1.3 million won’t you agree with me that we are indeed violent?
I agree, but that doesn’t absolve the police from…and this brings me to this point, why, Mr Commissioner, with all the resources given to the TTPS over the years, we still have this abysmally low crime detection rate?
As head of the TTPS I would like to see a better detection rate. We have focused on reaching a target of 30 per cent and T&T does not stand on its own, there at 23 per cent cent, and you look at this figure around the world, then you will recognise that it is not necessarily an extremely low detection rate.
Mr Williams, I am not doubting the accuracy of your detection figure but I am wondering how and when did we move from somewhere around ten to 12 per cent?
Around ten? No. Where did you get ten from?
Wasn’t this the figure being carried by local media for some time now?
Listen (eyes wide open)…if you just do the check through the years, the CSO published the statistics and you will find no ten per cent...what you would find is 17, 15, 18. And a closer check will show that there has been a progressive approach from the time I became head of the TTPS.
Yet, Mr Williams, the figure is still unsatisfactory?
What will be an acceptable detection rate? And acceptable in what context? All crime which is committed against people should be detected, that would be acceptable. But where in the world that happens? What do we factor in? A developed country has a particular rate, and T&T does not have it.
Mr Williams, I am sorry to belabour this point, but having seen police officers working abroad you get a sense they are more proactive, training…
(Interrupting) Are you really aware of policing in T&T today, or you just box yourself into a historical position that policing of the past was this way and it remains the said way as in the past?
Mr Commissioner, you see the problem I have is that the TTPS has been given a tremendous amount of resources over the years, yet we keep hearing about this rather low figure...
Resources for what? The bulk of the resources, financial resources, go into paying salaries.
So what kind of resources you want that you do not have?
For goods and services so you can advance yourself with cutting-edge technology which are out there in the world. We do not have what we would want to.
Are you saying, Mr Williams, that you do not have cutting-edge resources for your men and women of the TTPS?
I am saying that we do not have the best resources to do the job that we would want to do for the society of T&T. Every year I submit what we need, give the rationale for proposing what we have proposed and the Ministry of Finance decides what they would give us.
So you are definitely not satisfied?
I am not satisfied, and I am saying we will work with what we get.