Top Toronto cop to study crime in Jamaica
Last Updated: Monday, February 10, 2003 | 12:03 PM ET
CBC News
- FROM CBC TORONTO: The Jamaica Connection
Fantino has talked very little about the trip publicly, but the Jamaican government says the visit was prompted in part by a rash of violent crimes in Canada's largest city.
He will begin a series of meetings with authorities in Kingston on Monday, looking at everything from drug trafficking to community policy, before leaving Thursday.
Despite patrols by heavily armed security forces, Kingston's inner-city averages three murders every day. Gangs fight to control the streets, and most of the violence is over drugs.
Jamaica is located between drug-producing countries to the south, and drug-consuming countries to the north. With the narcotics and other contraband come guns and ammunition.
"We can expect the crimes that are happening in Jamaica to show up on the streets of Toronto, and the crimes that are happening in Toronto to have a relationship to Jamaica," said Kingston police Supt. James Forbes.
Last fall, nine young men were killed in a series of shootings in Toronto. One of the suspects, who was later murdered, turned out to be a Jamaican who was living in Canada illegally.
The slayings prompted Toronto's police chief to probe the possibility of links between gang violence in his city and deadly clashes in Jamaica.
Canada deports about 200 people back to Jamaica every year. In dozens of cases, the men and woman are being sent back because they've been convicted of crimes.
- FROM FEB. 7, 2003: Jamaican deportees denounce Canadian policy
There are no programs to help the deportees settle into their new lives on an island many do not know. Some were born there but grew up in Canada, and have no relatives in Jamaica or any money or other resources to get by.
Some people in Jamaica think that Ottawa's policy of deporting people is adding to the problem of crime in their country.
