The days of police officers investigating minor accidents or managing the office of the Police Certificate of Character could soon be over if Attorney General Dale Marshall has his way.
With a shortage of officers in the Royal Barbados Police Force (RBPF) to battle rising crime, Marshall told reporters today that consideration is being given on how to empower the force with the use of technology, and through the use of different policing strategies.
Speaking with the media as he hosted a Senior Citizens luncheon at the Grantley Adams Memorial School, Marshall said there was little to no reason for police officers to tend to fender benders and he’s ready to consider having the RBPF out of the process.
Attorney General Dale Marshall.
“Things like that are front of mind for the Attorney General and I am prepared to ask the Police Commissioner to bring me a proposal to decide which traffic accidents we are going to go to.
“Obviously you will go to very serious accidents, obviously you will go where there is a fatality but in many places of the world, police do not go to traffic accidents, those are matters for insurance companies because there is very little reason generally for a police officer to investigate a true accident,” Marshall said.
He added that attention would also be paid to how police resources currently in use at the office of the Police Certificate of Character could be otherwise deployed.
Marshall said: “Six police officers man the Police [Certificate of] Character office. That has to be a thing of the past, so we are going to be almost completely computerizing the Police [Certificate of ] Character Office to deliver a speedy, efficient service to Barbadians at a minimum cost.
“But you don’t need a police officer to check records to certify that an individual has been convicted or not. We don’t even need a civilian to do that technology can do that.”
The Attorney General noted that while history and tradition dictate that everything done in the RBPF is done by a police officer, it was not necessary.
