Commish vows to crush Clansman gang

December 03, 2020
Anderson
Anderson

Police Commissioner Major General Antony Anderson says the police force is still actively trying to dismantle the Clansman gang.

Scores of its members are expected to stand trial next January, and this "landmark" case, Anderson says, greatly stifles the rampant activities of the gang, which is based in Spanish Town, St Catherine.

Last week, two of its members, Cornell 'CJ' McKenzie and Dennis 'Steve' Francis, were killed in a gun battle with the police.

On November 17, 29-year-old hairdresser Shanique Thompson was arrested during an operation at her home and was subsequently charged with money laundering and possession of criminal property. Thompson is believed to be a high-ranking member of the gang, and spouse of the reputed leader Tesha Miller.

"Of course, with the major leaders in custody, this has caused some conflict within the gang, as people vie for leadership and other spoils. The gang is significantly degraded from where it was," Anderson said yesterday at a press conference. "We're still active against them ... and we've been continuing operations against them, and we're looking particularly at their sources of funding."

Fight each other

He added, "We find that as we incarcerate gang leaders and members of gangs, the new people fight each other to get dominance of the gang and this has led to a few killings, especially of gang members. With gangland shootings though, they are unconcerned about bystanders and sometimes other people get pulled in."

Anderson says the Counter-Terrorism and Organised Crime anti-gang unit, which focuses on larger gangs, will be ramping up its efforts.

"We'll be increasing these targeted operations and covering the spaces and routes that these gangsters use. Some of these activities may cause some inconvenience to the public as vehicular checkpoints and people checkpoints may create some delay," he said.

Speaking on the additional deployment of police personnel during the holiday season, Anderson said this started earlier than usual this year.

"We have scaled back our non-operational activities to provide additional resources including manpower to high-violence areas and centres of commerce. This emphasis will continue through to January 2021. And of course, the JDF (Jamaica Defence Force), who are our key partners, have called out their reserves and also have been deploying additional assets," he said.

He implored persons to avoid 'secret' party events, as "the normal safety that is monitoring these events is not there".

As of November 30, there has been a two per cent decrease in murders when compared to the corresponding period last year. There has also been a 1.4 per cent increase in shootings.

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