It’s their most alluring pull – a blend of tranquillity with enhanced security. With perimeter walls, closed gates, security checkpoints and even security patrols, residents flock to gated communities for the sense of safety they promise. Yet, last week’s murder of Barbara Gayle in the Caymanas Country Club Estate has shattered that illusion, exposing the vulnerability even within the most secure enclaves.
Caymanas Estate is one of the most secure gated communities in St Catherine. It employs a sophisticated security system with barcodes, pins, and passwords to protect the community from the outside world – and even to separate different sections within the estate.
Additionally, many homes, like the one where 77-year-old Gayle lived on Block A in Phase 1, are equipped with closed-circuit cameras.
Despite these efforts, the community has grappled with a number of security breaches, with Gayle’s murder on December 17 being the most horrific incident to date.
Her lifeless body was discovered last Tuesday with multiple stab wounds, hours after she was seen on her porch engaging in conversation with an intruder, who a police source said had climbed a wall to enter the community. Her cell phone and car were missing.
The Mercedes Benz GLE was found in bushes along Dyke Road on Wednesday. Hours later, the police said the main suspect in the murder had been arrested.
Contacted yesterday, Deputy Superintendent Michael Campbell, who is in charge of operations in the St Catherine South Police Division, said the man had still not been charged.
Last Thursday night, stunned neighbours gathered near Gayle’s home to pay tribute to the community stalwart at a candlelight vigil.
“You really come to realise that the only security you have is in Jesus Christ,” said Zoe Simpson, an elderly resident who gave a tribute. “The only true security is with Him. Nothing else.”
“You live in a gated community and you have this false sense of security that nobody can come in there and harm you, and you are thinking that if you see someone in there, they didn’t jump the wall and come in,” offered another resident and Gayle’s former colleague.
“So it would mean they had done their security checks and must be a worker or something, and then this is what happened. It is just so unfortunate. It’s actually very scary,” said the female resident, noting that since Gayle’s murder, she has been battling anxiety – checking every window, door and camera each night. “You hear about people breaking in, but you don’t expect someone breaking in and killing someone.”
While residents enter using a personal clicker and visitors must provide identification, some criminals bypass these measures by scaling the perimeter fence or tailgating authorised residents.
Similar concerns have been raised in other gated communities, like Phoenix Park, about the lack of proper monitoring of workers, many of whom are involved in break-ins. The suspect arrested for Gayle’s murder was known in the community as a part-time worker.
Like Caymanas Country Club, residents of Phoenix Park and other gated communities last week raised concerns regarding the systems in place to monitor workmen visiting the communities, who, on many occasions, have been found to be culprits behind the break-ins. The man arrested for Gayle’s murder was known in Caymanas Estate as a part-time workman.
“The issue is that many of the workmen are not formal. So you would employ one company to do a piece of work, but the men who he carries may not be of sound character,” explained Sandra Karr, vice-president of the citizens’ association at Caymanas Estate, adding that the association has been looking at bolstering security initiatives within the community, and that the matter of monitoring workmen is among the major issues.
But fixing certain security issues is easier said than done when up to 30 per cent of residents in some communities do not pay their routine maintenance fees, from which security and other community expenditures are met. It remains a sore point for Caymanas Estate residents.
“Maybe our loving Barbara would still be here if we were all cooperating. We cannot find the amount of money to pay for the things that we need to do in this complex. The major one is security and security is expensive,” charged Carlton Wilson, resident and retired assistant commissioner of police.
“When we all got here, we bought into the concept of our oasis and how we are going to keep it together. Sometimes for different reasons, some people fall out and are not living up to their responsibilities,” he continued. “The truth is that if we were all living up to our responsibilities, we probably would have found the resources to implement the kind of resources that we had set up to implement in this community, and that lady would still be alive.
“It is hard to say, but it is simply that we don’t have the money that we want to do because there are some of us who are not cooperating. I hope this will really bring home to some people what is truly at stake here,” Wilson said, hoping the tragedy will be a wake-up call to chart a way forward.
On the surface, developers are responsible for building the perimeter fence and security infrastructure, but it is up to the residents, via their associations, to cover the costs of ongoing security services, which often include guards – armed and unarmed, stationary and mobile; cameras; and other measures.
“Gated communities are the way to go because of the security component. We can understand that sometimes they don’t work out but for the most part there are some very good examples,” said CEAC Solutions Company Limited Managing Director Christopher Burgess, noting there is still a high demand for such houses.
“One shining example is Long Mountain in St Andrew ... . Still, if the residents work together, it is definitely the way to go based on Jamaica’s current situation,” said Burgess, who is currently constructing ‘smart homes’ gated communities, equipped with security cameras, in Portmore, St Catherine.
The Jamaica National Crime Victimisation Survey 2019, conducted by the Statistical Institute of Jamaica and the Ministry of National Security, with support from other agencies, revealed that the majority of Jamaicans (an estimated 1,899,678 or 90.3 per cent) felt safe in their homes. This was ranked lower than feeling safe at church (97 per cent), but higher than in personal vehicles (90.0 per cent), at workplaces (87.1 per cent), in educational institutions (83.1 per cent), and at banks (80.9 per cent). Parks, public transport, markets, and shopping centres followed, with ATMs on the street being the location where 56.3 per cent of people reported feeling unsafe. Other locations were cited by 54.2 per cent of respondents.
A breakdown of the data showed that more rural Jamaicans (91.3 per cent) felt safe in their homes than urban dwellers (89.4 per cent).
The survey also asked respondents if they had been physically assaulted by anyone, either at home or elsewhere, in the past 12 months. Over half of the victims of physical assault were female (55.9 per cent), and three out of every five (62.1 per cent) victims lived in urban areas. However, no further breakdown was provided regarding where the assaults took place.
In terms of motor vehicle thefts and vehicle parts, the survey found that the majority (82.9 per cent) occurred within the victims’ home communities, followed by incidents in the parish (12.0 per cent) and in another parish (2.0 per cent).
For most vehicle owners who experienced thefts in their home communities, 73.4 per cent reported that the incidents occurred at their homes. A further 10.7 per cent indicated the thefts took place in the street or an open space, 4.2 per cent at a stadium or sporting facility, and 11.7 per cent at other locations.
When it came to items stolen from vehicles, the home (42.8 per cent) was also the primary target for criminals.
In total, 28 per cent of respondents reported that thieves had targeted their homes. Of that group, 31.1 per cent said the criminals had robbed or broken into their houses while someone was present. In 13.2 per cent of the cases where someone was home, violence was used.
Earlier this year, the leadership of the St Catherine South Police Division pointed out that gated communities present a challenge for the police to access to carry out their duties, and are often used as havens for organised criminals. In October, police seized more than $38 million when they raided a property in Caribbean Estate. Two persons were arrested and several of their belongings confiscated as part of the operation.
There have also been reports of persons renting the homes for Airbnbs, but then using them to scam unsuspecting individuals seeking to rent them.
“It has come to our attention that there are elements within gated communities obstructing the police when we attempt to carry out our responsibilities. This not only hinders our ability to serve and protect but also emboldens criminal activities within these areas, which is unacceptable,” said then-divisional commander Senior Superintendent Christopher Phillips.
“I want to advise leaders in these communities that this must not happen,” charged Phillips, who noted during the town hall that gated communities are not necessarily safe, and called for cooperation from residents within them.
In the meantime, Lincoy Small, another of Barbara’s neighbours, urged residents of Caymanas Estate not to be fearful despite the dastardly murder.
“Let us not continue to live in fear from this. Let it allow us to be more resolute and strong. This will and should never happen again. And we must not take this only for a talking thing. We need to keep living for each other,” he said.