Over 600 murders committed under APNU/AFC’s watch

– 567 illegal firearms seized

A whopping 631 murders have been recorded in Guyana between 2015 and 2019, although the APNUP/AFC Government held out that the crime situation in Guyana was under control.

According to Acting Crime Chief, Senior Superintendent Michael Kingston, in the year 2015, there were 149 murders and in 2016, this figure was slightly reduced to 142.
A further reduction to 115 murders was recorded in the year 2017 and in the following year (2018), there were 111 murders countrywide.
However, with less than two months away from 2019 end, there have been a total of 114 murders recorded in Guyana, with disorderly murders dominating the list of the types of murders committed.
“In 2015, we have a total of 64. For 2016, 2017 and 2018 they are all over the figure of 50. And so, far for 2019, we are at 63”.
He explained that data retrieved by investigators reveal that disorderly murders frequently occur in interior locations such as Regions One, Seven, Eight and Nine and that this form of murder is of major concern to law enforcement officials.
“This is resulting from the heavy drinking and sporting. It is a known fact that it is not easy to contain this kind of murder. But we are partnering with our stakeholders at the moment in order to minimise this kind of behaviour within the interior locations”.
The Crime Chief (acting) also noted that in the interior locations, when the numbers of disorderly murders from those regions are added, the final figure is higher than the total number of disorderly murders committed in Region Four (Demerara-Mahaica), which caters for the largest population regionally.
Meanwhile, according to the Acting Crime Chief, with murders that occurred during the commissioning of robberies, there was a reduction when compared to 2018.
“In 2015, we started off at 24. We went up a bit to 28 in 2016 and in the years 2017, 2018 and 2019, there has been a reduction. For domestic murders, in the year 2015 we started at 21, for 2016 we came in line again with 21 and in the years 2017, 2018 and 2019 there has been a reduction with an exception of 2018, there was an increase up to 25”.
As it relates to execution-type murders, in 2015, while there were 11 cases, in 2019, only 4 have been recorded to date. However, Kingston added that in the category of unknown murders, in 2015, there were 28 cases recorded but this has been greatly reduced with only 14 documented for this year.

Bulk of illegal firearms being sourced from Brazil
Meanwhile, over the five-year period between 2015 and 2019, the Guyana Police Force (GPF) managed to seize 567 illegal firearms throughout the 10 administrative regions in Guyana.
According to Kingston, in the year 2015, 115 firearms were seized, 110 recovered in 2016, and in the year 2017, a total of 119 firearms were retrieved. Last year, the GPF seized 140 illegal firearms and for the year 2019 to date, there were 83 illegal firearms recovered.
“So far, we have seized 54 pistols, 16 revolvers, 9 shotguns, two rifles, one sub-machine gun. We also pay keen attention to the origin of these firearms. And so far, the research has shown that most of our firearms entered Guyana from neighbouring country Brazil with 177 illegal firearms”.
He noted that the second most popular country, which those illegal weapons are being sourced from, is the United States of America with 162 being seized in the last five years.
Additionally, there is a notable number of illegal firearms that the GPF was able to recover but the Force is unable to determine where those weapons were sourced from.
“Some of the firearms that we recovered does not have any serial number. It is being filed off. As well as where it is made, that is being filed off,” Kingston added.

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