Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin, commissioner of police. - Rudolph Brown/Chief Photographer

This is the final part of an interview with Police Commissioner Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin conducted by senior Gleaner writer, Earl Moxam. The first part of the interview appeared in The Sunday Gleaner yesterday.

EM: In respect of the murder rate, obviously there is a great sense of unease in the society. You have spoken, in a very personal way, about how you were touched by that in terms of the loss of your mother. What do you say to a public that is so traumatised?

HL: The country is not going to be served by finger pointing and blame gaming. What is important is that we have to recognise the role we all have to play. I saw where a business leader said recently that we need a magic wand; well, there's not going to be a magic wand! No magic wand is going to come; no foreign power is going to come and do the necessary thing to solve it. We created it; we have to solve it. It can be solved; it will be solved, but we must each recognise the role that we have to play and play our part. We will make progress. What I'm saying is that if we want to make rapid progress, then we all have to come on-board simultaneously.

EM: In your first press conference you made reference to the historical context in which the Jamaica Constabulary Force was established. How can the culture be fixed without deep-seated reorganising of the force itself?

HL: Well, I expect, out of the strategic review which is now being conducted, that there will be radical changes to how we train police, plan policing; how we deliver police services in Jamaica and I'm very confident it's going to do that; but I can't sit around and wait for that report to start taking the action. I won't be going in any direction that's going to be contrary to where the report is recommending. This is why I myself will be almost part of that committee, helping to steer, to guide and also to see what is emerging. So while working is continuing, what I'll be implementing will be in sync with the direction that the study is going, because, at the end of the day, we have to have ownership of the report. If we don't have ownership then you're going to have implementation issues.

EM: I have heard that that report should be available by about March next year. Is that correct?

HL: March might be somewhat unrealistic and my proposal to the team is that we need to look at it in chapters; so I think somewhere later in the year might be more realistic for the full report. If we do it chapter by chapter it means that we can roll out the thing in segments before you get the complete document. If we were to deal with the issue of the overall command and control and headquarters structure, how you manage the force, etcetera, we could roll that out because I need that very early on to drive the transformation process. And so in February/March, for instance, it is not unrealistic that that chapter could be finished and presented, while we carry on with the rest of it.

EM: I believe one of the issues that the team doing the strategic review will be looking at is the proposal that a substantial number of senior officers be sent on early retirement. Is this a proposal that you are in sync with in your own thoughts?

HL: I think one of the first things that they (strategic review team) did was to review all the previous reports so as not to reinvent the wheel. I can't say what will emerge from the team, but the fact that it was recommended before means that they will have to treat with the recommendation and see whether it is still relevant today.

EM: Would it help you in starting your new mandate?

HL: One has to be careful here because you can chop off a whole top of people, and then from where are you going to fill (the vacancies)? You have to be very careful. You can take a hatchet to the force and start hacking in all areas and so on, with dire consequences, on the one hand. Or, you could go there and with the skills of a surgeon and a scalpel cut out the cancerous bits as you transform. I rather think I'm a surgeon!