Robin Smith, the former National Police Chiefs Council lead on neighbourhood policing, has vowed to reintroduce community patrols ‘with teeth’, increase the visibility of officers in the town centre and improve partnerships with honorary officers.
Up to 30 new recruits are due to join the force over the next 12 months to bolster officer numbers to 215.
And detectives and analysts are working to establish a ‘drug problem profile’ to see how the Island’s drug culture impacts on other crimes such as theft and burglaries.
‘Our job as police officers is to avoid seeing what I have seen in London come to Jersey. I see very few similarities here with what’s happening in London but my job is to be active and ensure issues there do not become part of our community,’ he said.
The JEP revealed last year that intelligence units had mapped 11 organised crime groups operating in the UK and Europe which had targeted Jersey. This newspaper and colleagues in Liverpool spoke to two drug dealers who had operated in the Island who said Jersey’s attraction was high drug prices and a lack of ‘hurly burly’ – violence – with competing gangs.
Mr Smith stressed there was no ‘drug emergency’ in Jersey and ongoing work was standard practice for any force and part of work with the National Intelligence Model.
He added: ‘[Criminals] might say that [about the lack of hurly burly] but the gang they should be scared of is my gang. We will be relentless and if you come to Jersey to sell drugs we will catch you. We will be ferocious in the way we pursue organised crime gangs.’
The former Deputy Chief Constable for Sussex and Surrey Police and Assistant Chief Constable for the British Transport Police added that he had been ‘genuinely impressed’ by the force so far.
Asked if he had identified any weaknesses in his first weeks in the job, Mr Smith said: ‘There are very high levels of public confidence here; the threat is if you think you cannot improve that public confidence.
‘My challenge is finding a way that we can still provide the same top-level service against the backdrop of increased demand and rightfully high expectations. A number of years ago there was child sexual exploitation and modern slavery but we were blind to it. We are not any more. It’s difficult to understand the true scale of these offences. The danger would be if anyone said it did not exist. It’s important we have inquisitive officers who are always asking the right questions.’
The Jersey Opinion and Lifestyle Survey found that one in four of the 1,000 respondents strongly agreed that the States police did a good job and nine out of ten agreed at some level.
Speaking about community policing, Mr Smith said that as forces across the British Isles competed with cutbacks, they focused more on response policing than on proactive community work.
Mr Smith, who has already been out on patrol with officers – reminiscent of one of his predecessors Mike Bowron – added: ‘We are rebooting community policing. You will hear me talk about visibility, accessibility and engagement. I want to see police patrolling the streets with precision and high efficiency at the right times.
‘I also want community policing with teeth. It’s not just cutting ribbons – it’s nicking people that are committing crimes.
‘I have asked teams how we can be more visible. I want more police in the town centre and better working with our honorary police colleagues.’
