Tonight, the officers from Police Precinct system have its first complaint of police brutality coming from a member of the public. It concerns a worrying situation which is developing between the neighboring schools of Wesley Upper School, and Queen Square Anglican School, which are right across from each other on Dolphin Street.
Students from both schools have been ambushing each other and fighting. The situation escalated to the point in which a student was stabbed last week.
Police were called in to intervene, but according to Rosalie Williams, the parent of 2 of the boys suspected to be involved, they took it too far and brutalized 8 school children.
She spoke to the media this morning, and explained the situation.
Rosalie Williams – Concerned Parent
"I have two sons age 13 and age 14 years old - Isaac Williams and Isic Williams that are going to school at Queen's Square. On Tuesday when I came home from work they told me that they were taken from school that day to a police precinct by Police officers and teachers. I asked them the reason and what was it that they did. They told me they didn't know. What happened was that the principal called the Police that deals with the kids from that school to go to the school because of a complaint she received from a parent and a student from Wesley school. She believes that the older kids from standard five and standard six may have known about the incident so she asked the police to speak with them. My son said they were taken to the precinct where they were interrogated, questioned and beaten. When my son told me they were beaten - I couldn't believe this. How will they take them out of school without my knowledge and beat them. So I asked them about the principal and the teacher and they said that a teacher went with them. This morning I told them that I would have gone with them at the police station and the school to find out what happened. So far I have not been to the police station but I went to the school. I asked Yaya to accompany me and we both heard what happened. The principal told me she called the police to come because she got the complaint and she apologized to me for not notifying me that my kids were taken to the station and for what reason. She also mentioned that it was never her intention to allow the police to beat them. She thinks that they are in the wrong to do that and she has complained about it because she didn't know until the children were back and they informed her."
We spoke to the Commander of police Precinct 1, who categorically denied the claim. He also stated that his officers have been strictly trying to adhere to the goals of Precinct Policing. According to him, this claim, if it were true, would undermine the whole point of the system, which is to improve police public relations. Here's how he accounted for the entire intervention of his officers:
Supt. Alden Dawson - Commander, Police Precinct 1
"Sometime Tuesday morning the Principal Ms. Smith from the Queen Square Anglican Primary School called to this Police station and requested assistance at the school. Presently we have a community officer that works at a different sector of the precinct and two of the officers responded and went over to the school as in the norm. The school usually calls for the Police officers to intervene when there are issues at the school. This situation between Queen Square Anglican and Wesley Upper is an ongoing one. A month ago I had spoken to these same kids along with their parents and that was because of ongoing rivalry and bullying between the two schools. I spoke strongly to them in the presence of their mothers. That didn't change anything because they continued and sometime last week it led to a stabbing. On Tuesday something escalated at the school again and the Principal asked for the intervention. The Police went over there and brought over eight students along with the teacher since there were no parents at the school. They were brought here to precinct one and efforts were made to contact their parents and that was fruitless. While they were here, two senior police sergeant spoke to the kids in the presence of the male teacher and because they didn't get the parents they were then taken back to the school. At no time were they beaten."
Daniel Ortiz
"It is as you said - an ongoing situation and it is creating a street rivalry type environment where kids from these separate schools are antagonizing each other and it could lead to something serious as you notified us - it led to a stabbing; it could lead to something tragic if there is no major intervention. Can you tell us how Precinct one is treating that situation between those two schools?"
Supt. Alden Dawson
"Like I said, about a month ago i spoke to some of these same kids from Wesley, Queen's Square and St. Ignatius students. The information we had was that they were meeting each other after classes and then they attack each other. I had a strong talk and definitely we wouldn't want to see anything tragic end up out of this situation. We are dealing with this and we will definitely step up the Police presence in the school area and we will continue to deal with the matter. We deal with it at the level of the community officer since they are the people who try to work with these kids so as not to have them develop any criminal record. We are trying to work with them to bring peace instead of arrest. But in this recent case we are going to charge the young man criminally for that stabbing because we have spoken to him on more than one occasion and it came up again. If I'm not mistaken he is the same one that the mother says was beaten."
We attempted to speak with the principal of the Queen Square Primary School, who refused to grant us an audience. She sent back word to us that she was unavailable because she was in a meeting.
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