While emphasising zero tolerance for corruption in the police force, Police Commissioner Seelall Persaud on Wednesday said once police ranks are charged with certain crimes, they will lose their jobs.
Speaking at a force awards ceremony, Persaud noted that in the past ranks who were charged and placed before the courts would get half their salaries every month and in some cases they would take up other jobs since ranks who are charged criminally are interdicted from duty pending the outcome of the case.
“Many years after the witnesses, civilian witnesses in particular, get frustrated with the process in the court…the cases are dismissed for want of prosecution… so they (the police) come back and collect the other half [of their salaries] and they continued working. They are reinstated,” he further noted.
Persaud made it clear this will come to an end. “You’re charged and go before the court for certain types of offences, corruption and some other types relating to use of excessive force and deliberate criminal activity, then simultaneously with going to court you are losing your job,” he said.
He added that there will no longer be half salaries which will enable ranks to “cash in on the other half five or six years after. It means that you have to immediately find another job to pay your lawyers and everybody else.”
Persaud also revealed that next month the United States will be providing some assistance which will enable the force to revamp the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR). He said that recently the strength of the office has been expanded. The impending revamp, he added, will be centred on the training of officers, including the ranks in the complaints offices in the various police divisions.
“We will make the OPR more effective so that they can now start targeting, based on analysis, different types of unprofessional behaviour in the force,” he said.
Persaud also stated that government has indicated that it will address welfare issues, including allowances, health insurance and salaries for ranks.
During the award ceremony, over 1,000 ranks received cash incentives. Among the recipients was the police constable who was shot in the leg during Tuesday’s shootout with murder and robbery suspects at Craig, East Bank Demerara.
