Criminals, guns and the Prime Minister’s death penalty

At the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) Conference, Andrew Holness, prime mnister of Jamaica said he took the illegal possession of a gun very seriously and those people should be penalized with the death penalty, the highest level of punishment.

Holness believes that the Firearm Act should be reviewed in 2022. He understands that guns are being shipped into Jamaica in exchange for drugs with post-war countries from the North. “The problem we have in Jamaica is the mass, unregulated inflow of unregistered light arms and weapons’, said Holness.

Part 2 section 4 of the Firearm Act states that, “a person shall not import into, export from or transship in Jamaica any firearm or ammunition except under and in accordance with the terms of a Firearm Import Permit, Firearm Export Permit and Firearm Transshipment Permit”. In other words, without a Firearm Permit people should not be shipping any guns to and from anywhere.

When guns are shipped illegally the Resident Magistrates Court can convict someone and sentence them with or without hard labour for two years. If a person appears before the Circuit Court with the illegal shipment of gun charge, they can receive life imprisonment – no less than 15 years with or without hard labour.

Holness stated further that he wished the Firearm Act was more ‘draconian’ or rather harsh or severe in its penalties. People are using the excuse that the illegal gun is for defense; Holness dismissed this claim and declared that they should not receive light sentences.

“I don’t think it should be so extreme”, said Marsha Hayes who lives in a violent community. “The police cannot always protect you, so sometimes people need to have their own protection”, explained Hayes. She went on to say crime that crime was getting higher and was everywhere, “Jamaica nuh safe again. She added that gunmen were not afraid of any law and enacting such a law would not stop them from walking around or transporting guns into the country.

“When I use to attend school, the children of gang members use to talk about how their parents give them guns as a safety measure”, said a recent graduate of a high school in St Catherine. She is wondering what the Prime Minister would do if they found a teenager with an illegal gun.

Andre Coleman (not his real name), security officer said that these criminals were smart and he had heard of exportations where the criminals shipped different parts of a gun in separate shipments. Coleman thinks the government should have someone at customs who searches each and every barrel that comes into the country and not just depend on a scanner that does not pick up everything.