The Democratic Labour Party (DLP) says while it is backing Government’s proposed anti-gang legislation, the bill in its current form does not go far enough to dismantle the financial and organisational structures driving violent crime in Barbados.
DLP spokesman on legal affairs Corey Greenidge said the proposed Criminal Gangs Prevention and Control Bill represented an important step forward, but cautioned that it was too heavily focused on punishment and frontline offenders while failing to adequately target the deeper infrastructure behind organised crime.
“Let me say right off the bat that the Democratic Labour Party supports the introduction of the anti-gang legislation and in fact any legislation which is geared towards rescuing a nation from the crime situation that we have,” Greenidge stated. “Our role here . . . is not mere criticism. Our role is to add our voice to the debate.”
Speaking during Thursday’s press conference on crime at party headquarters on George Street, Belleville, St Michael, the attorney stressed that crime was no longer confined to isolated communities but had now spread into virtually every area of national life, “on the beaches, in our neighbourhoods, next to our schools”.
While commending provisions relating to witness protection, child recruitment and modern evidentiary rules, Greenidge said the bill remained overly enforcement-driven.
“It’s very strong on offences, very strong on arrests, imprisonment, detention powers and punishment.”
According to Greenidge, the proposed law aggressively targeted the “soldiers” of organised crime – the young men directly involved in shootings and gang violence – but failed to sufficiently dismantle the criminal enterprises behind them.
The Christ Church South candidate in the last General Election argued that modern organised crime was fundamentally sustained by money and that successful anti-gang models internationally focused not only on imprisoning offenders, but on economically dismantling criminal enterprises.
He said the legislation needed stronger powers to freeze bank accounts, trace gang assets, confiscate vehicles and property, disrupt suspicious financial flows and target front businesses allegedly tied to criminal activity.
“The bill as it stands does not expressly create any mandatory financial investigations alongside gang investigations. It is not strong on unexplained wealth provisions linked to gang activity.”
He noted that while Barbados already possessed proceeds of crime legislation, the DLP believed those laws were not sufficiently integrated into the anti-gang framework in a proactive way.
The spokesman also criticised the proposed definition of a gang within the legislation, which reportedly required five or more people.
Drawing comparisons with legislation in Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, Greenidge stated: “In Jamaica the threshold is two persons. In Trinidad the threshold is three persons. We are encouraging the Government to reduce the threshold to three persons. We know that within Barbados sometimes these gang-related activities are very decentralised, they’re within communities and therefore if the legislation is going to be able to capture that activity, we believe that the threshold of five may be too much.”
At the same time, he warned against allowing the legislation to infringe on civil liberties or criminalise mere association. “So it’s not just about association, it has to be about intentional participation in criminal activity.” (CLM)
