‘Elements of corruption will be rooted out’ - Michael ‘Mick’ Matthews
Speaking at a press conference yesterday May 3, 2016 at Police Headquarters on Waterfront Drive in Road Town, the Virgin Islands capital city on the main island of Tortola, Matthews spoke to the vexing issue of corruption and how he intends to deal with it.
“It was disappointing to me personally when I arrived to discover a number of officers currently interdicted or under investigation. You will all be aware that most recently officers have been arrested and charged for criminal offences,” he said, referring to Operation Lucan, which saw three officers of the RVIPF appearing in court to answer to charges of theft, being in possession of a controlled drug and other charges.
Matthews clarified that while he sought to make no judgement on the current case as everyone is innocent until proven guilty, it is absolutely right and proper that any suspicion of corrupt behaviour or corrupt practice must be thoroughly investigated.
“And while there may be frustrations in the community, in the media and indeed within the force with some of our own officers, these kinds of investigations take time and that particular investigation had been going on for months, for so long in fact that I was briefed on it in December 2015,” he said.
According to Matthews, it is necessary for the investigation to be conducted covertly so that the best evidence is captured and that justice can be seen to be done.
RVIPF not corrupt
Matthews was clear to make the distinction that while some officers of the Force may yield to the temptation of being corrupt, it does not mean that the entire force is.
“The Royal Virgin Islands Police Force is not corrupt. It has never been corrupt. It never will be corrupt. To say it is corrupt is a smear on all of the hard work of the honest, intelligent and dedicated officers that work for the Royal Virgin Islands Police Force,” he said.
“What is clear is that there is evidence that there has been some corrupt practice by a very small minority and we will continue to target, to tackle and to root out any form of corruption within policing,” said Matthews.
Interdiction process is too slow
The UK national Matthews, who last served as Chief Constable of the Cyprus Sovereign Base Area (SBA) Police Force, also expressed concern about the length of time an officer has to be interdicted while an investigation is ongoing.
“What I want to do first of all is to work out how long are we going to sit waiting to deal with interdicted officers because it seems a very slow process and having a number of officers who might be completely innocent and not being able to perform their duty is a problem for the force and is a problem for the public.”
“So I am going to be focusing on what is happening around those officers and reviewing those cases,” he said.
Counter-corruption strategy for medium term
Matthews said that in the medium term he intends to implement a full counter corruption strategy and as a result of this a senior officer of the Force attended a counter corruption workshop in Miami, Florida, USA to look at what good international best practice looks like and what could be brought back to the VI.
“I will not stand for corruption in the Police Service. It destroys confidence. It destroys people, it destroys reputations,” he said. “So if there is anymore to be rooted out we will root it out,” he said, noting that he has a record of standing against corruption.
Mathews further stated that in the first year of his previous post in Cyprus he had to remove and dismiss a number of officers for corruption.
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