Arsonists set new cop cars on fire
Burnt out police cars, 17 April 2018
(CNS): Two new police cars were set on fire in George Town in the early hours of this morning in a suspected targeted arson attack, according to the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service. Police said that the blaze happened before 2:45am on Tuesday, 17 April, at a local garage on Walkers Road. The cars were not occupied at the time and there were no injuries, and no other property damage was reported. Police are now appealing for witnesses to the crime.
“This is an unacceptable attack on law enforcement and government property,” said Police Commissioner Derek Byrne.
Interior of a burnt out RCIPS patrol car
“It will impact the patrols those vehicles were intended for, but more importantly, appears to be a continuation of reckless arson attacks on vehicles around the island last year. Such behaviour endangers everyone and must be stopped. We are asking members of the community to come forward with any information.”
Anyone with any information is asked to contact the GTPS at 949-4222. Anonymous tips can be provided to the RCIPS Confidential Tip Line at 949-7777, the Miami-based call centre of Crime Stoppers at 800-8477(TIPS), or online here.
Stop hiring people from a island next to us who have a culture of corruption, drugs as a religion, stealing, begging, and can’t read and write. We bringing our island down. We feel sorry it ain’t helping us or our grandchildren. These people have so many problems and they continue bringing their problems when they come.
Get that border control around these islands. Anyone can arrive here by boat tonight and be gone before sunrise. Build a marine base close to the sandbar to control entry through our channels. Start there first and you will see crime slowly go down. We need to sour the milk. Too much money coming in from drugs, stop the pipeline. We have always followed the USA whatever they do bad there, how about something good. The North Sound, East End and 7 mile beach have boats coming in and out who don’t need lights.
Governor are you seeing this? The criminals are winning. Mostly because there are so many of them and they have run this island for so long. This is their island. You want it you will have to take it from them and its going to be a big fight. Up to this point its all been about getting along with them. is that your plan too? If not you will need your own army.
How can you possibly think one man can fix all of the problems here? Why don’t you band together and stand up to these criminals and stop sitting around waiting for others to fix your issues you created yourselves.
You can’t fight family or culture.
11:33 is right on TARGET. And that statement can be used for many more behaviors in Grand Cayman other than crime
How will we know unless someone tries? He is the boss of the police you know. The last governor did nothing.
You better believe it. These police are no match for the gorilla warfare they are willing to bring if things get more enforced.
But how are they going to get the gorillas here? I know they bring in roosters on canoes, but an adult gorilla would be a whole different proposition.
This is a declaration of war. Caymans soft touch approach (very little actual law enforcement) is just a try at being culturally sensitive to a culture of criminals. Its not good enough for them and not working for the law abiding public. Do the job correctly or just give in. Your losing. If you can’t or won’t keep the peace then Cayman islands as we know it has no future in the modern world.
Although despicable act and blatant disrespect for Government property, surely the police can put officers out on foot if they are short of vehicles. If I m not mistaken didn’t one of these high up officers recently say they wanted officers out in the community on foot, perfect opportunity.
Maybe it was the same people who broke into the evidence lock up and took all the China white?
Rats ate that.
This is really ridicules. I wonder if they even though where who paid for these cars The People, tax money so we are hurting ourselves with stupid acts like this. We will all pay for this in one way or another. But I guess it is pointless to point this out, because if they tugs had any common sense they would not have done it.
Those of us that don’t want to assist the Police like is said hear, again we are only adding to the problem and one day it will reach home, by then it would have been too late.
I can only implore that for those law abiding people out there let us do what we can to assist in turning crime around our it will have a much more negative effect/result in the not too distant future.
This act of stupidity is really unacceptable.
And yet it is a normal thing for here. What does that tell you?
Police need to stop harrasing people simple.
Need more “harrassment” not less.
That is exactly the problem. Focus on real crime.
Perhaps the police will start taking the complete disrespect for Law and order seriously now they are targets rather than the rest of us. FFS how can the Commissioner just whine about this – get out there and stamp your authority on the situation. These guys are laughing at you. No fear of arrest, no fear of consequences, gun and violent crime out of control…… thought we brought in a big city Commissioner with experience of gang activity for a reason, not to just watch whilst local pissant would be ganstas run amok and even illegal dirt bikers run the streeets with complete immunity. Hell, any given day you can see people driving around with no licence plates and illegal tnt and nothing happens – why are you surprised when thugs think they can just set fire to your cars with no consequences. Wouldn’t have happened in Derek Haines day, I can tell you. Perhaps you can get him out of retirement to tell you how to do your job.
I barely recognise my country today.
The formula is NOT working folks.
We can fight and debate each other until we are blue in the face, but we are CLEARLY and quickly moving away from the stellar standards we once all enjoyed.
Change can be a good thing, but this isn’t it.
– Who
WOW! This is TERRIBLE! Can’t someone call the cops?
That’s cute
Why not say that this will NOT impact the patrols? Go rent two cars for a month. Keep up the pressure. Don’t just throw up your hands and surrender, RCIP.
appealing for witnesses for something that happened at 2:45am?!…CCTV?
“but more importantly, appears to be a continuation of reckless arson attacks on vehicles” sir the word arson means – deliberately and intentionally setting fire…..not like they were reckless and threw their spliff into the car window and the car caught fire.
Was the accelerant gas or something else? If something else, might be easier to try and track that.
I believe he means a reckless act. which it is ‘ a reckless act of arson’. Nothing wrong with that statement at all.
The accelerant was more likely to be petrol than gas.
Errr….do you live here? Its the same thing.
Another for the list Mr. Governor sort out the rubbish CCTV on this island it is so third world.
5:44 Apparently the contractors, who in fairness were working to a design that was drawn up by someone employed by CIG who knew nothing about CCTV, ripped out the screens already installed in the 911 centre and replaced them with lower spec equipment. This has been an expensive joke from Day One.
Feels like an attack aimed at weakening the police. Organised crime? Needs hitting really hard before it becomes too organised. Community needs to step up too. It’s everybody’s issue, not just the police’s.
Agreed and a good point. Given recent arson attacks on vehicles , disregard for the RCIPS aka moto’ cycle vagrancy , violent attacks on officers in their line of duty , leaving about $200 Grand worth of new vehicles out in the open & not under any type of security surveillance , is it tough to now understand why they were targeted? At least now the C.O.P may awake to the situation at hand in these islands. If I was in his shoes, I would see no police vehicles are [ now] left un-guarded with no security , thats 24 / 7. Hopefully they were insured and can be replaced quickly to enhance operations they were intended for. An awful waste of money, to see such vandalism. Why no security provided by the dealership, either ????
Whether the vehicles were insured shouldn’t matter as the company that had custody of them was responsible for them and they have to be insured. This act has perhaps delayed extra police cars getting onto the streets but the monetary loss will fall to whichever company was taking care of the cars.
Organised crime is “organised” at the highest levels of respectability.
This may have something to do with all those traffic tickets that were issued last month.
Perhaps the attending officers can recall some highly pissed off individual(s) after the ticket was issued as a possibility of revenge.
Bit drastic for a speeding ticket don’t you think.
“It will impact the patrols those vehicles were intended for”…and with that, the Commissioner concedes victory to the arsonists! Most COPs anywhere else would reassure the public, and discourage criminals by stating the polar opposite: ie. that patrols will now double, or triple, or quadruple in response…the playbook here seems to be to rollover and do nothing! #insidejob #notourfault #keeppayingusthough
Hopefully they’re caught and put behind bars for many years.
What the heck!
You will see. Truth be told, if you’re looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it.
Agreed. So do I. More police on the way. The hammer of Choudhury will soon fall, but his hammer is small compared to the Almighty.
Without law enforcement no jurisdiction respect their police.
Last Sunday the motor bikes went down Spotts raceway half of them doing wheelies. Anyone on the road see gross speeders daily. But the prison is full.
Cancel the pier and enlarge Northward and start arresting law breakers and forget bail.
Better still start shipping them to jails in Honduras – that would be a real deterrent 🙂
Shipping them to Honduras..when Honduras has way more serious crime than we have..???
Petty “criminals” sometimes learn from REAL criminals in jail..
Can anyone not see that
1) We have MADE “CRIMINALS” of of folk who were NOT CRIMINALS *(*Robbers,theives,murderers,rapist,) by persisting with the insane American/British idea that using the cannabis plant constitutes “”criminal behaviour”..For DECADES we have ABUSED our vulnerable young men (who often come from “homes” that were vicerated by the “distraction of our adopted/imposed American “model” lifestyle pursuit of “money and the frivilous things it can buy”)
How about decriminalizing “street drugs”..and teaching the citizens the TRUTH (sets you FREE!) from the time they are able to understand and reason?
Turning our country into a “police state” with more STUPID “laws” to follow is NOT the way FORWARD ..in my opinion..
After a serious shooting incident 10 years ago I joked with the RCIPS press officer that soon we’d be putting up signs that read, ‘George Town twinned with Beirut.’ Many a true word spoken in jest?
@12:30 Where’s the LOL button when you need it?
Wow…. we keep hitting new lows everyday. No respect for authority. Talk about heads need to come out of the sand and face the reality of what we’re dealing with in the new Cayman Islands. Sad bleak future
And all the tourists filling the hotels are reading this and saying the “trips been lovely, but prices are really high and they torch the police cars. “
Police upset someone…
What a despicable act!! What is going to happen next? Ambulances, Fire trucks, boats, aeroplanes? There’s nothing too hot or too heavy for these criminals. These animals need to be tracked down ASAP and the full force of the law bestowed upon them. The criminal element of the whole island is out of control!
Arson is the least of their worries. They better hope that the gun amnesty is successful and they manage to get those WWII unstable explosives off the road. Someone turned in a grenade before so i am sure that was not the last one of its likes.
Parked right next to the chain link fence on Moxam Rd.No need to enter the compound just splash some gas over the fence and onto the cars. Not a good parking location for police vehicles.
Makes you wonder.
There’s been a declaration of war on police for some time now. There is no respect for the law or law enforcement. There is a brazen disregard for rules, especially road rules such as licensing of cars, speed limits, cell phones, etc.
The more one gets away with braking the “small” rules, the more comfortable one feels pushing the limits and eventually pointing the finger at the law and the police.
The “Broken Windows Theory” is apparent.
Catch us if you can!
Don’t make me bring out the broke neck wire.
You’ll fall off and break your neck soon enough , kisses xxx
There is no respect for the law or law enforcement. .. agreed! but! its a 2 way street. and police here seem to have EGOs out their asses and have no respect for the general public. they want respect from the public, but does the police have respect for the public? THATS where the problem is.
Respect or no respect you still have to abide by the laws. That’s no excuse.
Where have you ever been that police don’t have big egos? That is such a sorry way to look at it and excuse bad behaviour from the public. You are expected to obey the laws regardless of how you feel about them. Walk a mile in their shoes and see some of the horrible things they have seen or have had to deal with. I’m sure they are sick and tired of the local turds as much as the good people of Cayman. What do you want? Them to bow down to you ?
I sure hope they have CCTV in that area. This incident is terrible. The RCIPS may not be perfect but we all need to support them!
They will have my unflinching support when I have theirs. All I ask is that they enforce the Law, all of it, and all the time. When they start at least making obvious efforts to do so, I will change my tune. Right now offences are obvious and in plain sight every-time I go on a road, let alone Public Beach. The descent in to lawlessness has not only happened in plain sight, it almost seems to have happened under their supervision!
In that case, do not aid to the problem. Help the police, the community, any way you can is what this county needs. Enough of the public turning a blind eye!
I have, and do. You should try reporting an employer for literally stealing pension monies (deducting from employees but not depositing it into pension accounts and using the money to buy a new car) as I have. They literally refuse to act.
Again we are asked to help without any information. Where did this happen?
Vampt motors..
Insurance is just common sense for all vehicles that is on island. Insurance should cover the vehicles. Problem here is that someone other than the arsonist knows who did this or suspects. Call crime stoppers or police. We need to rebuild our community and stop these criminals. No better time to start than now.
Mr. Premier? they are setting fire to police cars…..what’s next?
C’mon, we got serious issues here in Cayman, this is a disgrace!
The honorable premier and honorable Hew are on top of this.
CCTV anyone?
That VAMPT lot is covered in CCTV. But if the perp wore a mask good luck finding him/her.
How would they know that? Did they work there?
They aren’t hidden cameras. You can see them all over the place.
Hopefully the cars were insured. CNS can you confirm?
Hopefully they were not insured, or the rest of our premiums can expect an increase.
And that’s your only concern? You sound like the devil!
Exactly what other concerns should I have? The news did not report any injuries or deaths….. I just want to ensure the RCIPS had half of brain to insure their BRAND NEW patrol vehicles so that the public purse does not get hit twice. Because if you did not know, the public purse paid for those vehicles to begin with.
You sound extremely ignorant, please stop making imbecile remarks.
They will be insured as ‘Business Insurance’ and I know Vampt will replace the cars very quickly.
The company tending to the cars should have been insured so whether the individual cars were or not is irrelevant.