St Barb’s, Laventille, residents say they now have no trust in the Police Complaints Authority (PCA) in the wake of Gillian Lucky’s departure from the body entrusted with watchdogging the service.
The residents were speaking with police at the scene of a protest in the community, a few feet away from Second Hamlet Trace, where 27-year-old Kerron Wellington was killed by police Wednesday night.
Lucky, who had built a reputation as a no nonsense investigator of complaints against the police, resigned abruptly on September 2 and was appointed a High Court Judge a few days later. Yesterday, residents said rather than take their latest claim of police abuse to the authority or the police, they preferred to take matters into their own hands. One woman said she would rather die than put her trust in the police. Wellington, according to police, was shot and killed at Second Hamlet Trace, St Barb’s, after he and another man shot at them. Residents said Wellington’s killing angered them because he was a hard-working man who was not known to be involved in anything illegal.
His brother, Keston Wellington, said had his brother been involved in criminal activity the community would not have been as enraged as it was. “How we could go to them, when them is the ones killing?” an outraged woman said as she gestured at police. Another resident said Wellington was shot dead a house away from where he lived and if she had been raped by police she would rather go to a gangster than call the police. Wellington’s sister, Krystal, said she was at home when she heard the gunshots that ended her brother’s life but assumed it was a resurgence of gang warfare in the area.
Commenting on the residents’ lack of faith in the police and the PCA yesterday, Police Social and Welfare Association secretary Insp Michael Seales said the problem was that some people were out to destroy what the police had regained in terms of public trust and confidence. He said people were doing an injustice against themselves by not having any faith in the police and policing bodies. Saying the PCA is still in existence, he called on the residents to await the outcome of due process. “If they take matters into their own hands then the we would be on a collision course and that would lead to more people being harmed,” Seales said.
