JUST ONE YEAR old, and already Operation Kingfish is creating waves in the fight against organised crime, as it is successfully putting a big dent in the criminal networks in Jamaica.
With several organised criminal networks severely impacted, 140 illegal weapons seized, three illegal airstrips used for trafficking drugs destroyed, and 235 persons arrested for various offences, head of Operation Kingfish, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Glenmore Hinds, believes the task force is meeting its precise mandate.
In a JIS release, Hinds said that Kingfish's precise mandate is to dismantle the major organised criminal networks operating in Jamaica, which he estimates to be about 13.
He says it is important to identify the common theme among them to better dismantle their operations. "They all have a common theme in that they are all involved in illegal drug trafficking, illegal arms running and extortion, so we felt that it was necessary as a first step to starve these networks of funding," he stresses.
One of the first steps taken by Kingfish to ensure this was done, was to aggressively pursue maritime conveyance, which resulted in the seizure of some 53 boats as well as the interception of cocaine coming into the island.
But the task force did not stop there, as they sought to tackle the issue of illegal airstrips, three of which have been completely destroyed. "The other thing we looked at is if you impact on the maritime conveyance, then certainly the traffickers would then resort to some other mode and so we also began to look at our illegal airstrips and we were able to disable three of those," Assistant Commissioner Hinds points out.
In terms of impacting the major organised criminal networks, he says that one has been totally dismantled, the activities of five others have been severely disrupted, while the others have all been impacted in some way.
"Some key players in these networks were also arrested and these were some of the major successes that we would have made during our one year of operation," he informs.
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