Opposition Home Affairs spokesman Maxwell Burgess has called for Police to employ a gang expert to crack down on rising lawlessness.

He said unless the Island made a stand now Bermuda would go the way of Jamaica where murders were commonplace.

He said Bermuda Police force, which was now searching for a new Commissioner, needed a 21st century version of Frederick (Penny) Bean and there were one or two old fashioned Police officers waiting in the wings.

?What we might need is to go outside Bermuda and find someone in law enforcement ? probably North America, the US in particular ? whose used to dealing with gangs and gang violence and let them come and assist the new Commissioner and his team in coming to grips with the unacceptable level of gang violence.?

He said unless the gangs were broken up now they would expand their power.

He said: ?Bermuda is at the cross roads and we have an unacceptable level of crime in our society. We have two young men disappear and we simply don?t know where they are today. The Bermuda I came up in would have had any number of groups out looking for these young men but we have seen no such actions.?

He said people were quietly allowing street justice to take place. Unfettered crime will decimate Bermuda?s fragile economy which relied on foreigners arriving ? either for international business or tourism, said Mr. Burgess. ?If you can?t guarantee them safety you are in trouble.?

He said Bermuda could be in desperate straits within two or three years unless action was taken.

?We are on that slope and to suggest we are not is purely acknowledging our denial. The Police by themselves cannot do it,? said Mr. Burgess who said discipline in schools and the home was vital.

He called for a public debate with a clear action plan drawn up and implemented. ?New York never got cleaned up until New York said it had enough. You can walk the streets of New York today with, dare I say it, equally as much safety as you walk in Bermuda today.

?We are in tough times and the times call for tough measures,? said Mr. Burgess who said judges should not have their hands tied with weak sentencing powers.

And he said the time may have come for Casemates to be re-opened.