Her Excellency the Governor and the Honourable Premier Joint Statement on Crime – Summary of Remarks:
Today, the Governor and I share your grief and anger at the needless loss of life that has afflicted our community.
We condemn these reckless acts against our nation, and we extend our deepest condolences to the family and friends who are suffering from these senseless acts.
This scourge of violence robs our youth of their future. It ruins lives. This is not a reflection of the values of the good people of this country.
Understandably, we hear the call for action. We have been resolute on tackling threats to the safety of our communities.
We want to assure you the police are actively investigating and implementing safeguarding protection measure of all witnesses to recent violence. We now want to explain to you how we are utilising every lever at our disposal to support law enforcement and assure the safety of our communities.
On the immediate operational response, we have secured a rapid deployment package with the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO):
1. This includes the deployment within the next seven days of six firearms officers and a firearms commander to provide an immediate boost in tactical manpower.
2. Five investigators are also being deployed to drive forward investigations of the recent incidents to support operations of arrest in bringing those responsible to justice.
3. It is also critical we build our strategic intelligence-led operations and therefore, the deployment also includes a firearms operations planner and a criminal and intelligence analyst.
These individuals will expand our capabilities greatly to target our resources against the criminal networks.
We have extended Operation Shepherd for the TCI Regiment to continue to provide operational support to the police and are actively pursuing additional tactical support from regional partners.
In building longer term capability and resilience within the RTCIPF, we will be launching a targeted recruitment campaign for experienced tactical officers and serious investigators.
In addition, we are working with the FCDO to secure a wider comprehensive package of critical assets to strengthen intelligence and operational tactics. These assets will provide a step change for our law enforcement agencies in the fight against organised crime.
We are also working to strengthen border security and have secured UK investment in maritime support to improve our surveillance capabilities and domain awareness.
We continue to work with the US and Canadian law enforcement partners to underpin interdiction operations and enhance our resilience.
Our response needs to be holistic. The National Security Council is marshalling a multi-agency effort across law enforcement, immigration, prison, education, social services, health and the judiciary to reinforce efforts to tackle crime, stop its causes and mitigate its effects.
This is our end-to-end to plan to detect, disrupt and dismantle criminal networks, with an emphasis on addressing the drivers of crime.
The police are working on ways to care and protect vulnerable and intimated witnesses to come forward.
We appeal to everyone to help the police with their investigations. Any piece of information – however insignificant it might seem – can be pivotal to bringing the perpetrators to justice and restoring calm to our neighbourhoods.
May God bless you and may God continue to bless this beautiful by nature, Turks and Caicos Islands.
