Domestic violence more than spousal abuse – Grant
Published:Friday | February 12, 2021 | 12:29 AM
Domestic violence is one of the driving forces behind violent crime in Jamaica, but retired Deputy Commissioner of Police Novelette Grant is concerned that it is not taken seriously across the society.
“I don’t think we understand domestic violence in Jamaica. We narrow it to the view that it is spousal violence and that it is man-and-woman story and it’s kind of private,” Grant said on Wednesday.
Her concern follows the gruesome murder of 51-year-old Andrea Lowe-Garwood as she worshipped at the Agape Christian Fellowship Church in Falmouth in January. Police have since charged three persons in connection with her murder, which allegedly stemmed from a family dispute over property.
Grant said that family feuds continue to form the basis for vicious crimes in Jamaica but lamented that domestic-violence laws were weak.
“I have had in my policing experience where you go into a community and it’s under violent crime, and when you check it out, family violence is at the root of it,” she told editors and reporters during a virtual Gleaner Editors’ Forum.
She is particularly concerned that children from abusive households have become easy prey as gang recruits. Father absenteeism and parental abuse were cited among the factors causing the crisis to spiral.
“If we are not able to start to raise our children to better manage conflict, if we are not able to have families that can better manage their disagreements, then we are going to be in trouble,” Grant said.
Grant said she was disappointed that several social-intervention initiatives geared at tackling crime had been allowed to fizzle.
This included a project that involved transitioning boys from the streets into places of safety. She recalls several cases, too, where she interfaced with teens who were wooed into a life of crime. One was just 13 years old.
“It’s like the abuse and the violence that they live just moves them right over into gangs,” she said.