‘Help turn young away from guns’
Residents across the island can play a part in the healthy development of young people so that the schoolchildren of today do not become the shooters of tomorrow, the Commissioner of Police has said.
Darrin Simons hailed the support provided by members of the public who furnish his officers with information before or in the wake of a gun attack.
He highlighted that the work was two-pronged and said organisations or individuals aside from police are better placed to help grow well-adjusted young adults, potentially arresting criminal careers before they even start.
“The harsh reality is that there are 12 to 14-year-olds today, who are probably exhibiting signs of antisocial behaviour, that may become shooters in a couple of years,” Mr Simons said.
He noted that since 2014, through forensic analysis, police have identified 88 unique firearms used on the island; 31 of those were used more than once, “some of them, a lot”.
The police commissioner said that 40 have been recovered by the police and 48 remain unrecovered.
He added: “Given the high level of repeat firearms, those that are predisposed to using them have limited access.”
Mr Simons noted that there was “a historical use” of shared firearms on the island, and the Bermuda Police Service believe that the weapon used in a double murder on Court Street last month was one of those.
“There are a number of incidents linked to that, including some very significant firearms incidents in Bermuda’s history,” Mr Simons said.
Antoine Daniels, the Assistant Commissioner of Police, added that an individual believed to have connections to the weapon was “being quite heavily targeted” by the BPS as a leader of a prominent gang on the island.
Police believe that the Court Street incident on August 12 — when Nakai Robinson, 18, and Natrae Eversley, 23, were killed — was linked to earlier gun attacks.
A revamped island-wide CCTV network that cost $1.5 million to install has yet to cover Court Street, The Royal Gazette has learnt.
Darrin Simons, the Commissioner of Police, confirmed last week that the new iteration of the island’s camera system was yet to stretch to the busy road, where two men were killed last month.
He said: “The Court Street cameras are part of the second phase of the CCTV project because of the complexities of installing poles and cameras in the City area — that requires trenching, that requires power to be brought to the pole and all of this happens underground in an area that has a lot of existing underground works.”
Mr Simons added: “The other piece is the challenge with getting business owners to agree to put CCTV cameras on their buildings.”
Michael Weeks, the Minister of National Security, told the House of Assembly in March that the system would cost about $3 million in maintenance fees, expected to be spent over the next five years.
He said that the network consisted of four different types of camera — 19 licence-plate-recognition cameras, 103 pan-tilt-zoom cameras, 74 multisensory cameras, and 62 varifocal cameras.
When the system was announced in 2023, Mr Weeks said: “The primary objective of this project is to improve the security and surveillance capabilities of the BPS.”
Referencing the case of a double murder last month, Mr Simons noted last week: “We did capture CCTV from businesses which will be helpful, as we do in most investigations, and there were incidents where the government CCTV assisted in that investigation, clearly, categorically, without a doubt.”
Mr Simons said that owing to a “number of cancelled opportunities” by an external vendor, train-the-trainer instruction on the CCTV system for a group of BPS officers took place only last week.
He added that the training will soon be rolled out to a greater number of police to provide a quicker review of footage.
Mr Simons said that a key advantage of the training would be that instead of having to call in an officer at the time of an incident, dispatch staff will be in a position to efficiently use the programme, allowing for greater immediacy.
He said that about 400 camera views were provided by the network but, owing to teething problems, “there may be occasions where some of the cameras are not working or not transmitting”.
“Any time a camera is not working, it’s not ideal,” he added.
Mr Daniels pointed out that targeted operations such as stop-and-search efforts also provided opportunities for firearms recovery, whether at the time of the initial check or after a warrant is executed for the search of a residence based on items discovered during the stop.
He highlighted that only a small number of people were “brazen enough” to operate a firearm.
“Just like you have repeat firearms, you have repeat users,” Mr Daniels added.
Mr Simons said that an investigation into the whereabouts or use of a weapon was like any other.
“We get community information that helps us identify and locate firearms, and we have our own dedicated intelligence-gathering activity that assists us,” he explained.
“There are occasions where the community is particularly helpful in identifying where firearms may be hidden or individuals that they believe may be holding them.”
Mr Simons said: “Providing the police information either before something happens or after something has happened is the No 1 way that the community can assist with crimes that have occurred.
“There is a broader perspective here that violent crime occurs because people in the community are willing to use violence to resolve their conflict.
“The question is, how can the community help to stop people, children, thinking that that’s an appropriate response to conflict?
“It is often said that law enforcement will never solve social ills.
“A point that I want to make is, if we arrest a 16-year-old, that person was likely at school and there are opportunities for us to intervene in young people’s lives in a way that can help grow well-adjusted young people, or divert people who are perhaps on a difficult path away from those choices.
“Others beyond the police are better suited to that task, like schools, churches, sporting clubs, social and community organisations.”
He added: “You have to look at that in two tranches: there is, something has happened and what do you do? Then there is all of that social prevention work.
“One of the points that I continuously make is that the people that we are investigating today are not the people we were investigating five years ago.
“If we arrest a school-aged teenager in connection with a shooting, a couple of years ago, that person probably wasn’t giving any thought to taking up a firearm.
“What happens in the life of a ten-year-old, 14-year-old that causes them to think that shooting is an appropriate action to take to resolve conflict?
“How can we grow more well-adjusted young people so that we stop the progression from a ten, 12, 14-year-old becoming somebody that’s connected to gangs, influenced by gangs and willing to perpetrate these heinous acts?”
Mr Daniels highlighted that only a minority of young people became involved in offending or associating with organised crime groups.
Mr Simons pointed out: “Police are predominantly equipped to deal with crime after it’s happened.
“There are others that are best positioned to do the prevention work.”
He added: “The research is very clear that the involvement of one significant adult in the life of a young person can really make a massive difference — they’ll talk about risk and resiliency factors, and that is one of them.
“That doesn’t have to be a parent, because we often look at the breakdown of a home and say we’re doomed, but what we know is that it could be a grandparent, it could be a coach, a neighbour, a family friend, just one individual that takes a meaningful interest in the life of a young person that could really divert them.
“How are we, as a community, investing in those types of programmes to bring about more of that change?”
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