Mr. Carruthers who was appointed the chairman of Crime Stoppers, a charity, this year following the retirement of Mr. McNeil Warner.

Question: As the new chairman could you give an overview of Crime Stoppers? Answer: "Let me begin by stating that the last year has been an enormously successful one for Crime Stoppers Bermuda. We have enjoyed, for the first time, the full time services of our coordinator, Alex McDonald, and this has begun to generate great results.

"Also contributing to the years success has been the establishment of an offshore telephone answering facility through Miami which brings a greater element of anonymity for our callers and expands the number of hours over which the calls can be taken by trained personnel.

"I would highlight the success of our efforts on Hamilton's docks which took our programme onto the cruise ships and the customs areas. We have distributed our literature, put up our signs and met with the officers and crews of these ships.

"The results have exceeded our expectations and we have had several successes in uncovering drug-related crimes. So successful has been this initiative that it is being copied in Miami and certain Caribbean islands where cruise ships are regular visitors. This initiative has led to a strong relationship with our Customs officers and we applaud the way they have bought into our programme and bent over backwards to assist us.'' What is your vision for the next year for Crime Stoppers? Answer: "My vision is to continue and expand this success. In the next year our first task will be to take the cruise ship programme to the commercial boats which visit our waters. It is an obvious next step following our success with the cruise ships.

"Originally we used to refer to Crime Stoppers as a three-way partnership between the public, the media, and the police. This has recently been amended to replace the word Policewith Law Enforcement Agencies. We have come to realise that Crime Stoppers can be an effective information gathering system for many more services than our Police Department.

"Customs are a shining example and other agencies we can help are The Prison Service, Park Rangers and our Fishing Wardens. We therefore intend to establish relationships with these agencies and determine how best we can work with them to gather useful information.'' "Also in my term of office I would like to find a way of taking some form of our programme into our schools. Obviously this has to be done in a way which does not put our children at risk. Care must also be taken to ensure that things do not get blown out of proportion by bringing law enforcement agencies into a situation which would be more appropriately dealt with by the school.

This being said, however, we believe that the schools would be a productive source of information about illegal activities.'' Question: How did you become involved with this organisation? Answer: "I got involved in the organization at its inception when I represented my employer, The Argus Group, at the initial meeting which gave birth to Crime Stoppers Bermuda. It attracted my interest and I joined the first Board of Directors.'' Question: Exactly what do you do as chairman? Answer: "My duties as Chairman are: To chair the executive com mittee To call and conduct Board meetings Oversee the recruitment, ori entation and retention of Board members Act as an ex-officio member off all committees Officially represent the orga nization as a public spokesperson Provide leadership to the or ganization "In this small Island it is hard for us to perform one of the ser vices which works well in larger countries .... crime re-enactment. We have tried to do this but, by the time we had the video ready to air, the police had already solved the crime. There is also, thank goodness, a lack of significant large crime to feed a programme such as `the Crime of the Week' as is aired in some places.

"Crime in Bermuda is mainly drugs related. The vast majority of the calls we receive are drug related. This is what led us to the cruise ship initiative.

Bermuda gets the occasional spurt of stolen motor bikes and house break-ins but we get few calls about these activities. It follows that our activities are tailored to the drug scene. A good example of this is the Rat on a Rat ad campaign which is evidenced in the full page ad in the Royal Gazette upcoming supplement on Drug Awareness.

Question: Have you had any fund raisers which you would like to mention? "We have just completed a very successful fundraiser in the form of a golf tournament which raised over $5,000. I would like to take this opportunity of thanking all of our sponsors for their contributions. Our next fundraiser is still in the planning stage and is not ready to be unveiled at this time.

Question: Do you have any other comments? Answer: "It would be inappropriate to not have some reference to the outstanding contribution of McNeil Warner to our organization in this the year he has retired as our chairman. Mr. Warner has headed the organization since its inception and I cannot thank him enough for the contribution he has made.

Bermuda is a better place because of his efforts. We are proud that he has become the first Patron of Crime Stoppers Bermuda.'' Crime Stoppers' chairman: David C. Carruthers DRUGS DGS