Rohee passes buck to Top Cop on torture reports

“Ask the Commissioner, I ain bun nobody hand…”

Who should give account for allegations of torture of civilians by members of the Guyana Police Force?
Minister of Home Affairs Clement Rohee is still insisting that Commissioner of Police Seelall Persaud is the one who must do so.
“I don’t know about them things, you got to ask the Commissioner. I ain’t  bun nobody hand; I does give away things; I does hand over things to people,” Rohee told Kaieteur News yesterday after handing over some $15 M in items to several Community Policing groups.
“You ever hear Rohee bun anybody hand or put any gun in anybody mouth? Ask the Commissioner, he (Persaud) got to answer to he people, I got me staff, I does answer for me staff.”
At the time, Kaieteur News was asking the Home Affairs Minister about 19-year-old Junior Thornton whose hands were badly burned after police ranks allegedly doused them with methylated spirits and set them alight.
This newspaper was attempting to query whether, in the wake of the Thornton case, Government would now acknowledge the need for an Inquiry into reports of police brutality.
It is the second time this week that Rohee has distanced himself from allegations of police torture of civilians. He had previously said that police ranks are answerable to the Commissioner and must answer to him for their misbehaviour.
He had also stated that his Ministry has no policy to carry out torture and has never issued any instructions or directives to the Commissioner of Police or his ranks to carry out such acts.
Government has denied that there is widespread reportage of acts of torture in Guyana by ranks of the Guyana Police Force. It recently rejected a motion by Leader of the Political Opposition, Brigadier (rtd) David Granger, for a Commission of Inquiry into the torture of persons by ranks of the Guyana Police Force, between 2006 and 2013 and to make recommendations to prevent a recurrence.
But this was before the alleged torture of Junior Thornton at the hands of ranks at Sparendaam Police Station had surfaced. That matter is at present still under investigation, as well as allegations that a police Cadet Officer shot 15-year-old Alex Griffith in the mouth.
Last week two police ranks were charged with assaulting Timehri resident Colwyn Harding while he was in custody.
Three years ago, a court awarded $6.5M to 16-year-old Twyon Thomas, whose genitals were doused with methylated spirits and set alight by police during a murder investigation in 2009.