Acting Chief Magistrate wants bootcamp for teens involved in crime

Expressing serious concern about the number of teenagers ending up before the law courts and at Dodds Prison for committing crimes, Acting Chief Magistrate Deidre McKenna insisted that steps must be taken to reverse this trend, including the creation of a boot camp.

“Do you know how many 17-year-olds are in Dodds right now? We are losing our youth and they need to understand that when they go down the wrong path, it is difficult to get back on the correct one. I would like a boot camp to be created to get you all back on track and I would send all of you there,” she stated.

She was speaking in the Oistins Magistrates’ Court on Thursday after Rashad Alexander Williams appeared before her on a robbery charge.

The 17-year-old of Buckingham Road, Bank Hall, St Michael, admitted that on Christmas Day, he robbed Hasani Hinkson of a bag valued at $75, a $20 wallet and $470.

Station Sergeant Vernon Waithe told the court that the complainant was standing along Prescod Bottom Boulevard when the accused and two other men approached, pushed him onto the ground and beat him before robbing him of the property and running off.

Williams however denied that he had robbed the complainant of any money and that he or anyone else beat the complainant.

“He owed me money and he wouldn’t pay me back but I didn’t take any money from him. I tek weed from he cause I was gine sell it to make back my money,” he said.

“So you were going to do something else illegal on top of the robbery,” the magistrate stated.

Warning him to change his behaviour, she advised, “There will be nothing left for you in the future because Barbados is too small and people will say ‘He does rob people, or he does beat people or he does smoke weed’. So when you get wiser and look for a proper job, nobody wants to hire you because of your previous behaviour. So then you will fall back into crime and end up either in jail or six feet under. Something has to be done about this situation. We are losing too many of our young people to crime. Whoever friends you with, you need to stop with them. Stop hanging around people not headed in a legal, proper direction. Any of them here for you? Any of them got charged? You see any of them outside? Any of them willing to stand bail for you? But you are following them. Does that make sense?”

Magistrate McKenna ordered a pre-sentence report for the first time offender, released him on $3 000 bail with surety and placed him on a 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. curfew.