OAS helps to fight gangs

Speaking in the Senate on Tuesday, the Minister said the OAS classified gangs operating in the hemisphere as “regular, delinquent, violent and criminal gangs.” Joseph said during an April 3 and 4 meeting of Caricom security ministers in Port-of-Spain ahead of a special Caricom Heads of Government crime summit, an OAS official offered the organisation’s analysis of the emerging gang threat within the Americas.

The Minister explained that the OAS has placed gangs in four distinct categories “ranging from the relatively harmless to the extremely violent gangs with ties to transnational organised crime.” He said different prevention, rehabilitation and control strategies are used in each case.

He then disclosed that an OAS team will be going to Antigua and Barbuda in the next three weeks to conduct a gang assessment there and produce a report to that country’s government containing recommendations to address the issue.

Joseph added that the OAS has offered to make this report available “to other Caribbean states with emerging gang problems.”

The Minister did not say how the estimated 86 criminal gangs operating in the country were classified. He did not respond to Independent Senator Professor Ramesh Deosaran’s argument that a member of US Professor Stephen Mastrofski’s team, Prof Charles Katz, claimed there were 95 gangs in TT and not 86.

While noting the OAS said “private security is playing an increasing role in areas where there is little or no police intelligence,” Joseph did not comment on the “Tabaquite phenomenon” where that constituency’s MP Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj enlisted the services of a private security firm to help protect constituents. The Minister added that a report issued last year by the American Chamber of Commerce states: “A fantastic opportunity exists for TT to emerge as a world leader in establishing private security standards.”