Plan of Investigation

Artefact 1: Article

Jamaica Pays Dearly For Youth Crime, Says UN Report

Published:Thursday | February 9, 2012 | 2:00 AM
Arthur Hall, Senior Staff Reporter
Youth crime is costing Jamaica billions of dollars each year and choking the life out of the
economy.

That is one of the major findings of a new study by the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP), which has confirmed that crime is having a devastating impact on the economies of
Jamaica and other Caribbean states.

According to UNDP Caribbean Human Development Report 2012, launched in Trinidad,

Jamaica has the highest number of youth convicted of crime in the region. The report noted that
Jamaica spends more than US$529 million (J$46.5 billion) every year as a direct public and
private cost to fight youth crime. This is calculated based on direct expenditure to fight crime
and potential revenue which stays away from Jamaica because of the criminals. It is estimated
that because of youth crime, Jamaica loses US$4.3 million in potential investment each year
while a further US$95 million, which would flow into Jamaica through tourism, goes elsewhere.

The UNDP report estimates that youth crime in Jamaica is costing the country as much as 3.21
per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP).

Threatening livelihoods

According to the report, "Crime has become one of the main challenges threatening economies
and livelihoods in Caribbean countries, but the right mix of policies and programs can halt the
problem."

"Overall, youth crime is costing CARICOM countries between 2.8 and four per cent of GDP,"
stated the report, as it noted the number of criminal gangs operating throughout the region.
According the report, with the exception of Barbados and Suriname, homicide rates - including
gang-related killings - have increased substantially in the last 12 years across the Caribbean,
while falling or stabilizing in other parts of the world. The report also noted that gang-related
homicides in Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago are "substantial and increasing".

In 2006, Jamaica experienced 1,303 homicides, of which 32.5 per cent were gang-related. By
2009, the number of homicides had increased by 377 with 48.1 per cent gang-related.

In 2006, Trinidad and Tobago experienced 371 homicides with 26.4 per cent gang-related. By
2009, the twin-island republic reported 506 homicides with 34.8 per cent gang-related.

Need to rethink approach

This report stresses the need to rethink our approaches to tackling crime and violence and
providing security on the ground," said Helen Clark, UNDP administrator, during the launch
yesterday. "We need to follow approaches that are centered on citizen security and address the
causes of this recent increase in violent crime, including social, economic, and political
exclusion," added Clark. The report recommended that Caribbean governments implement youth
crime prevention through education, as well as provide employment opportunities that target the
marginalized urban poor. It stated that a shift in focus is needed from a state protection approach
to one that focuses on citizen security and participation, promoting law enforcement that is fair,
accountable, and more respectful of human rights. Among the recommendations in the report is
for Jamaica and other regional states to achieve a better balance between legitimate law
enforcement and preventive measures, with a stronger focus on prevention.
Artefact 2: Article

When A Child Kills

Published:Sunday | March 18, 2012 | 3:00 AM
10 children are on murder charge; Six serving time for murder
Many incarcerated for manslaughter

Tyrone Reid, Senior Staff Reporter

During the first decade of the 21st Century, criminals in Jamaica ruthlessly murdered more than
1,500 children and teenagers. Data also indicate that a number of Jamaican children also commit
murder and other crimes.

According to statistics from the Planning Institute of Jamaica's (PIOJ) annual Economic and
Social Survey of Jamaica (ESSJ), between 1996 and 2001, some 629 recorded murders were
committed by youths 17 years old and younger.

That same age group was responsible for a total of 4,523 recorded major crimes - murder,
shooting, rape/carnal abuse and robbery - during the same period.

Data obtained from the Department of Correctional Services showed that 10 of Jamaica's
children are currently jailed on murder charges while six minors have been convicted of murder
between 2007 and 2011.

The number of child/teen killings between 2001 and 2010 could have easily doubled, as statistics
published by the PIOJ show that 1,600 more were gunshot victims. Statistics on the number of
minors serving time for manslaughter was not immediately available.
A senior officer within the penal system explained that the number of children convicted for
murder could be higher but the justice system tends to be more lenient with minors charged with
murder.

Gruesome Incident
The Sunday Gleaner source revealed that a boy who poured petrol on a homeless man, set him
ablaze and watched him burn was among the number of children serving time for manslaughter.
The boy was 14 years old at the time of the gruesome incident.

When contacted, Jamaica's prison boss - Lieutenant Colonel Sean Prendergast - confirmed that
the number of children incarcerated for murder would spike if the manslaughter numbers were
added to the murder figures.

"It would increase if we included manslaughter, and then you would get some more alarming
data," said the commissioner of corrections.

Prendergast said he could not say why the courts reduced the charges. However, he pointed out
that the penal system currently houses several child killers.

"We have a number of juveniles who are responsible for deaths but are with us on the charge of
manslaughter," Prendergast revealed.

The head of the Department of Corrections said the society should be alarmed when a child
commits manslaughter or murder and that the issue should be addressed in a multifaceted
manner. He also believes the Government is trying to do just that with the Ministry of Justice's
child-diversion policy and the restorative justice programme, in addition to other initiatives being
spearheaded by the national security ministry.

Dr Clayton Sewell, a consultant forensic psychiatrist at the University of the West Indies,
believes the country should be very concerned about the number of children charged with and
convicted of murder.
"There is anecdotal evidence to indicate that juveniles have become more involved in
committing violent crimes, including murder. The extent to which they do so is to be fully
determined. Like other crimes, the ability to quantify may depend on the investigative abilities of
a particular jurisdiction," noted Sewell.

Violent Society

The forensic psychiatrist added that the nation would have to look behind the numbers to see the
full picture. "The numbers, though they appear low when compared to the adult murders, support
the view that our society is a significantly violent one," he said.

Sewell added that the early commission of violent acts has been shown to be associated with an
increased risk for continued violence. "As these individuals mature they are more likely to carry
out a variety of criminal acts, especially where there are insufficient attempts at rehabilitation."

The forensic psychiatrist also argued that substance abuse has an effect on violent behaviour and
referenced a study which unearthed that some children start to abuse substances like marijuana
from as early as age 11.

In a written response, Carla Francis Edie, chief executive officer of the Child Development
Agency, told The Sunday Gleaner that the nation was failing its children.

"No child is born as a murderer and to have one child in such a situation is a tragedy. It means
that, as a nation, we are failing our children.

She added: "A child who is a perpetrator of a crime is likely to have been a victim
himself/herself ... a victim of violence and abuse
Artefact 3: Article

Youth at risk — The ties that unravel

BY MARCIA SEPAUL editorial@jamaicaobserver.com

Monday, July 23, 2012

STEPHEN, at 16 years old, is a youth in conflict with the law. Chances are he committed his
first offence at 10 years old, according to a 2008 World Bank Study of Youths at Risk in
Latin America and the Caribbean.

According to that study, Jamaican youth begin to engage in violent behaviour at an early age (10
to 15 years) and that age group accounted for about two per cent of those who were arrested for
criminal/violent activity in 2007.

The typical youth at risk, like Stephen, would, according to the study, have been charged for
unlawful wounding. The weapon of choice — the knife. Most crimes committed by youth at risk
are done in an urban area with gangs in the community. Kingston and St Andrew is the parish
most likely to have at-risk youth.

Stephen is a stereotype of the youth at risk in Jamaican society. His foray into juvenile crime has
probably been fuelled by a variety of factors, including having a family member who has been in
conflict with the law, being affiliated with a gang and using drugs such as marijuana.

Disconnect from family, school and society are also emerging as leading factors contributing to
delinquent youth behaviour in Jamaica.

According to the World Bank study, feeling disconnected from school has emerged as an
explanation for all kinds of risky behaviour, and some argued that it has been the most important
influencing factor.

School connectedness — feeling that someone in a young person's school cares about his or her
well-being — is negatively correlated with school repetition, early school leaving, premature
employment, risky sexual activity, early sexual initiation, substance use and violence.
Connectedness is not the same as attending school, the study said, nor does it have to do with
school quality because young people in both lower and higher ranked school can feel school
connectedness, the study found.

However, schools with dangerous environments and overworked teachers were less likely to
connect with students than safe schools with a caring staff, according to the World Bank report.

The importance of school is supported by the report 'Children in Conflict with the Law' by the
Office of the Children's Advocate (OCA) in Jamaica. Identifying why children are in conflict
with the law, practitioners working with at-risk youth pointed to poor parenting (60 per cent),
lack of adequate supervision (60 per cent) and frustrations with school or being illiterate or 
semi-literate (74 per cent) as critical factors.

Some practitioners also pointed out that poor literacy leads to poor reasoning. This results in
violence where even simple conflicts, such as a disagreement about who is the best entertainer,
might disintegrate into an altercation. At-risk youths like Stephen, according to the OCA, are
also likely to admire deejays such as the controversial artiste Vybz Kartel.

Poor reasoning, combined with the other factors, make at-risk boys vulnerable to being exploited
by others, including 'dons' (49 per cent), to whom they turn for fatherly support, and negative
peer pressure (37 per cent).

The issue of parenting is also critical. The OCA report indicated that one of the strongest
predictors of children coming into conflict with the law is poor parental monitoring and
supervision (Gibson, 2002). The World Bank study agreed, reporting that the feeling of having a
parent who cares is a protective factor for several risky behaviours.

"He would have often heard that he is loved but might have missed school because his parent
told him that bus fare and/or lunch money was not available," said the OCA report, in its profile
of a 'Child in Conflict with the Law'.

At the same time, young people who feel a connection with a parent are more likely to stay in
school, would not enter the labour force prematurely (or if they do they remain in school);
initiate sex at a later age and use condoms; avoid the use of drugs and alcohol, and be less violent
than those who do not have this emotional connection to their parents, the World Bank 
report said.

Quite likely, Stephen lives with his mother — who is head of the household — and with two to
four siblings, although he probably has more siblings outside of the home. If Stephen had lived
with both parents he might have become involved with fewer kinds of risky behaviour, compared
to at-risk youth who live with one or no parents.
However, regardless of household structure, young people who participate in activities with their
parents, who feel that they can talk to their parents, or who feel a sense of closeness to their
parents are less likely to engage in risky behaviour than those who do not have these
connections. They are less likely to get involved in negative behaviour that would disappoint and
embarrass their parents.

While family harmony could help to prevent youth butting up against the law, household
poverty, which is a strong and consistent correlate of several risky behaviours, makes this hard to
achieve. A number of children live in single-parent homes and single parents facing economic
stresses and working long hours and often unable to provide the levels of monitoring and
supervision necessary to keep their children on the straight and narrow.

One organization throwing its energy behind the effort to keep more of Jamaica's at-risk youth
on a crime-free path is the Rotary Club of Kingston. On July 7, 2012, the club launched
BACK2LIFE, its 2012-2013 major project which it is hoping will break the cycle of crime and
reduce recidivism among male juveniles in Jamaica, beginning with the wards incarcerated at
Rio Cobre Correctional Centre in St Catherine.

The club has joined forces with the Children First agency to implement BACK2LIFE, which will
use strategies like life skills development, life coaching and mentorship to engage the boys at Rio
Cobre and address some of the issues affecting them.

"The whole effort is meant to reduce crime. This will take time, but in the short run, our aim is to
help those incarcerated young men and to give them an alternative to the path they are on," said
Rotary Club of Kingston President Manley Nicholson.

Several BACK2LIFE strategies dovetail with the recommendations of both the World Bank and
the OCA, as well as successful initiatives implemented in Jamaica. Two major ones are using
volunteers to provide youth instruction and mentorship.

"We want to involve as many players as possible, including those who were there before and can
offer experience to guide us," said Nicholson. "We have to get the Ministry of Justice and other
key people involved. We want to be as inclusive as possible, and we are depending on volunteers
to help us achieve our objectives."

According to the World Bank, effectively reintegrating at-risk youth into society requires
carefully targeted programmes designed according to the evidence of what works. One such
intervention is mentoring, which has proven to be a cost-effective means of affecting a range of
risky behaviours including crime and violence, substance abuse, and school dropouts. When
compared with other successful risk-prevention programmes, mentoring consistently shows high
rates of return.

Nicholson said mentoring was at the heart of BACK2LIFE, adding that the club was seeking 100
mentors to help make the project a success. "We want to match each ward at Rio Cobre with a
caring adult who will provide coaching and role modelling," he said. "To have this male figure in
their lives, one-on-one relationship with a positive male showing them care and attention, is not
something many of these boys would normally have."

BACK2LIFE will spend some $28 million to help the boys at Rio Cobre turn away from a life of
crime.

The Rio Cobre Correctional Centre currently houses 93 boys between 12 and 18 years old who
have been incarcerated for crimes such as larceny, possession of offensive weapons, possession
of drugs and other minor offences. The centre prepares them for school examinations, offers
vocational training and where possible, behaviour-modification programmes. However, the latter
two are at times cancelled or put on hold due to a lack of funding.

According to the Economic and Social Survey of Jamaica, three per cent of persons arrested for
major crimes were in the 12-15 age group, and 21 per cent of major crimes were committed by
those 16 - 18 years. These crimes include murder, shooting, robbery, rape, and carnal abuse.
Victims of these violent acts were also young persons.

Typically, uncontrollable behaviour accounts for the largest number of children admitted to
institutions, followed by charges relating to dangerous drugs, larceny, wounding, possession of
offensive weapons and shop/house breaking, the OCA report stated.

In addition to the emotional and physical cost to the boys, risky youth behaviour reduces
economic growth in Latin America and the Caribbean by up to two per cent annually, costing the
countries billions of dollars.

Stephen, our stereotypical youth in conflict with the law, would have contributed to the cost of
crime in Jamaica a whopping $12 billion in 2004.
 Reflection One

This has been an inspirational journey but also a rough one. I face many challenges but with
quality time which was invested, assistance of group members and class teacher I was able to
overcome them all. Being the first batch to be introduce to the S.B.A, I was so uncertain of what
to do, even though I was given a guide line, I was still puzzled on how to conduct this
assignment and going about choosing a topic. Also extra time had to be made to complete this
assignment and this I found quite difficult to do with such a busy schedule of mine, along with
other assignments been done.

Honestly, I found my S.B.A topic interesting due that I was very familiar with this issue. In the
society teenagers are known to be involved in many illegal and promiscuous activities which
most times place them behind bars. Daily reports are made and broadcast by, editorials and
newscast groups where juveniles are incrassated for acts committed against the law. This topic is
view as an alarming issue which has impacted the society in a negative manner. Conducting this
assignment, I aimed to highlight this concern and be able to target this issue from a different
point of view.
Reflection Two
 Reflection Three

I had to change my topic twice due to failure, not been able to find artefacts to support it. Also
with the lack of resources and poor internet connections it was indeed very difficult to access the
information needed, thus I took longer than I expected to complete my profile. However, though
I face many challenges I was able to overcome them all. Soon as I got access to the internet, with
the aid of friends and families, I visited sites which had outlines of the SBA and articles relating
to my topic.

Also due the changes of the SBA outline over time been, I had to use my spear hours after school
and during lunch breaks to seek guidance from various English CESC teachers to gain help in
organizing and compiling my work in order for the complexion of my profile.