Ross Sheil, Staff Reporter
( L - R ) SHIELDS AND GREEN
TWO MORE British policemen have signed contracts to join the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) at the rank of assistant commissioner of police (ACP).
However, a third, who would have been appointed to tackle corruption, declined the offer.
Metropolitan Police (New Scotland Yard) detective Paul Robinson will start on April 18 and Scottish officer John McLean on May 29. They will be responsible for firearms standards and community policing, respectively.
ONE POST LEFT
Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of National Security, Gilbert Scott, told The Gleaner that in the meantime the Police Service Commission would have to renew its search to fill the last of the four advertised ACP three-year posts.
"In any country, when you have negotiations it takes two sides. We thought we had a deal, but he decided not to join," explained Mr. Scott. He declined to give a specific reason, except that the length of negotiations might have been a factor.
The two new ACPs will join recently-appointed Scottish detective ACP Les Green, one of four officers from the United Kingdom to be appointed to that rank within the JCF. Responsible for homicide and serious crime investigation, ACP Green was one of several British officers working in an advisory capacity under Operation Kingfish.
He now works directly under Deputy Commissioner of Police Mark Shields, who made the switch from New Scotland Yard to the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) last March. His secondment will end on March 1, after which he will be fully employed to the JCF for the remaining three of his four-year contract.
BRITISH RECRUITS SUCCESSFUL
Announced last October, the strategy to recruit foreign officers, funded partly by the British Government, was advertised in that country, the United States, Canada and Australia. However, only British candidates were successful.
The Permanent Secretary had called the recruitment campaign an "infusion of a body of talent from outside (which) will help to accelerate modernisation".
The posts advertised are in the following areas: homicide and serious crime investigation; professional standards and anti-corruption investigation; operations and firearms; and community policing and crime
disorder partnerships.
