Traffic cops’ pleas fall on deaf ears

| 02/11/2021 | 60 Comments
Cayman News Service
RCIPS officers at traffic stops on Grand Cayman

(CNS): Despite their warnings and prosecution efforts, police responded to around two dozen crashes over the weekend as Operation Quaker, the current RCIPS road safety campaign, continued. However, it appears that drivers are not listening. Several of these collisions saw those involved injured, including the couple that were badly injured in the early morning crash in Savannah on Saturday.

Officers also arrested four drivers this weekend for driving under the influence, including one driver who was more than two and a half times over the legal limit. Ten people were also arrested for speeding, among other traffic offences.

The operation aims to reduce serious and fatal collisions on the roadways as well as enforce road safety rules, such as not using mobile phones while driving and not having excessive tint, but bad driving remains a major problem on local roads. Nevertheless, police said they will be continuing the weekend campaign until the end of the year as part of the annual holiday clampdown on rogue drivers.

Motorists and other road users can expect to see an increase in spontaneous vehicular checkpoints throughout the island, with a focus on the weekends. The RCIPS is imploring everyone to do their part in “Making the Cayman Islands Safer” by practicing good driving habits and encouraging others to do the same.


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Category: Crime, Police

Comments (60)

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  1. Anonymous says:

    It seems that this is a trait of British oversight.
    Happy to co-exist with lawless locals as long as their interests are met.
    Algeria, anyone?

  2. Anon says:

    And yet you’re all clamouring to decriminalise cannabis 🤦🏻‍♀️

  3. Anonymous says:

    I’ll take some idiot speeding over going onto a roundabout side by side with half you lot any day. If you actually stayed in the correct lane, used you mirrors and didn’t drift around oblivious to anything beyond your damn phones the bad boys in their POS Hondas wouldn’t cause you too many problems.

  4. Anonymous says:

    What’s the point of well lit and illuminated “checkpoints”. People just either a) turnaround in advance or b) abandon their cars at the side of the road and then walk. The number of sometimes abandoned car on the bridge near the Kimpton heading up to Batabano/WB some Sunday mornings is unreal. You’re not telling me they’ve all broken down in the same spot!

    Do it in undercover plain vehicles

  5. Anonymous says:

    I regularly run at 3 or 4am from various start/finish points across the whole Island, and can say I haven’t come across a single cop car during that period (other than them being at crash scenes). What are they actually doing to clamp this $hit down, the public see nothing.

  6. Anonymous says:

    How many tickets do the FRU teams write during their 98% downtime when not responding to firearms calls?

    • Anonymous says:

      They can’t write properly, their large biceps don’t allow enough motion to scribe.

      Plus, they’re all action. They don’t do boring stuff.

  7. Anonymous says:

    How do convicted drink drivers manage to get insurance and back on the road with no problems?

    • Anonymous says:

      They don’t get insurance or a license and just hope they don’t get caught. The penalty for driving without insurance is cheaper than having insurance hence it’s a risk some people are happy to take.

    • Anonymous says:

      They don’t. They usually carry on driving. The lack of prison sentences for disqualified drivers who keep on the road is to blame.

  8. Anonymous says:

    The three lanes exiting East on the Hurleys rouandabout at Grand Harbour has become a very dangerous race track. Someone is going to die if the police do not deal with this situation.

    • Anonymous says:

      This is not a police issue other than ticketing terrible drivers.

      The roundabout is terribly designed. Plus drivers don’t help with their brainless efforts. For example, if you’re exiting South Sound to head east, use your indicator. That way, vehicles heading east who have just passed Kings don’t need to keep stopping, as in theory the lanes are kept apart. Of course, they don’t indicate, so cars wait and wait, and then those idiots use the inside lane.

  9. Anonymous says:

    Barcam Esso area is useless for speed enforcement. There’s few crashes there during the day, so, do it on a night. Perhaps also stop and fine all the idiots with foglights on, the high beam retards, and the ‘every colour but white’ headlight crew – seriously, RCIPS are going to allow multiple vehicles to drive around with bright blue LEDs???

    • Anonymous says:

      if all we had were the foglights and highbeam geniuses we would be in a better spot by far. I can handle those. The rainbow boys with RGB underglow and headlights are another story, not to mention the flashing red brakelights. I can maybe recall seeing a parked police speed trap ONCE. Not sure why they insist on having all the kings men out on fridays and saturdays in the same spots week in, week out, when the reality is you’ve got idiots blasting past 55+mph on the kings roundabout and bypass all hours of the day, 7 days a week. What is the point of having these solar powered radar speed cameras when they don’t do anything, at least install the proper ones that capture license plates when over a certain speed…

  10. Anonymous says:

    I can’t understand how the RCIPS went from consistent enforcement of the traffic laws to these periodic enforcement operations. How many traffic officers does the RCIPS have? Who is responsible for the traffic unit at the RCIPS? What are the specific tasks that they do on a daily basis?

    • Anonymous says:

      Years ago they dismantled the traffic department. The COP at the time didn’t think we needed one. They only recently enabled it again, over the last 3 years.

  11. Anonymous says:

    *european standard I mean

  12. Anonymous says:

    Speeding isn’t the issue. Ok you get some people driving crazy fast, but most accidents are due to the terrible driving along the local population. Not indicating, not being in the correct lane in roundabouts and the highway etc. the only solution will be to make them all take a Europeans tankard driving test.

  13. Michael Day says:

    To the arsehole reckless speeders I say FU!

    I was 2 seconds from death this evening. Driving towards town on Walkers Rd at 6:30 indicating to turn right onto the Green Roof building, a car raced passed me overtaking at 60+ mph. Had I turned then lights out for me.

    This is unacceptable.

    To the police: I have a lot of time and respect for you. It’s not an easy job (if you do it). Please deal these selfish pr&”ks. I am alive to ask because of the pure luck of a second or two’s timing.

    Thankfully

  14. Anonymous says:

    If the motorcyclists take off and don’t stop for Police, there’s a “no pursuit” policy. Cops aren’t allowed to chase them.

    And cops can’t identify anyone because all the riders are wearing helmets and the motorcycles have no license plates.

    Too many restraints put on the police. Let them pursue and lock up these motorcycle morons.

  15. Anonymous says:

    Regulating taxi prices has fallen on deaf ears for years.

  16. Anonymous says:

    Not going to catch me……….. I quit drankin

  17. Ex Cop says:

    People drive like that because the penalty when they get caught is peanuts…….. or nothing! If the drivers had to pay a meaningful fine it would stop most of the law breakers after one arrest. For the hard-headed the court could add putting them in the slammer for six months or so. Whatever it takes!!!

  18. Anonymous says:

    Time for Uber.

  19. Anonymous says:

    There’s an institutional lack of imagination not only throughout the RCIPS but also among those responsible for them, ie the governor and his office. I am slowly coming to the conclusion that control of the police should be taken from them and given to a committee of concerned citizens, to whom the so-called “service” would then be accountable.

    The governor hasn’t a clue how angry the public are with the RCIPS’s lack of pro activity. Why? Because the only people he gets advice from are the Commissioner himself and the DG.

    • Anonymous says:

      The very thought of your “committee of concerned citizens” makes me shudder. Of course that wouldn’t be used in any way to settle decade long scores. Wow. No thanks. The last people who should ever be given power are people who want power.

  20. Anonymous says:

    When the police are jut as bad as everyone else, who cares?

    They don’t use indicators, always on the phone, tailgating, switching lanes without warning etc…

    • Anonymous says:

      PWD pickup truck passed me on the Linford Pierson yesterday with the “your speed” sign flashing 72!! Put speed governors on gov’t vehicles, as well as GPS based logging of all activity. Hold the driver responsible for their bad actions.

      When gov’t vehicles are flagrantly violating traffic laws, how can we expect the general public not to do likewise??

  21. Anonymous says:

    Why would any one think these type drivers would listen ?

  22. annonymous says:

    Everyone is on Drinking and Driving. Don’t get me wrong i do not argeee with drinking and driving. The real problem isn’t drinking and driving. It is people just can’t drive on this island. How many accidents are due to drunk driving. Catching 4 drunks doesn’t equate to the accidents. Cops can’t catch speeders as all their speed traps are sitting. They don’t hide so they don’t fool anyone. Every person that goes past a cop car starts flashing their headlights on on coming traffic. I

    • Anonymous says:

      If drivers indicate their turns and intentions then traffic flow would be much better especially at the roundabouts. It is in the law that tickets can be written for lack of indicating turns. Can you imagine the amount of revenue the government can collect for that offense alone? Cayman drivers are very inconsiderate.

    • Anonymous says:

      From what I understand drivers here are not breathalyzed as standard procedure after an accident – so there is no way of judging whether the abysmal driving that resulted in the accident was due to the driver being drunk/high on drugs or both. Also unlike other countries a drink drive conviction in Cayman is not recorded as a criminal offence so the punishment has minimal impact on lifestyle. Drink/drug driving is a huge problem on the islands, it just seems there is little genuine interest to really expose the scale of the issue.

      • Make the drunks pay for damages says:

        I don’t know about others, but they breathalyzed me and the other driver after my vehicle was hit on a Saturday evening at 8:40pm on the bypass. I blew zero and he blew over .13 and was subsequently cuffed and taken in. The last update I got was that the drunk was going to be prosecuted for drunk driving and either reckless or dangerous driving (I don’t remember which.) Curiously though, they still haven’t given me the full police report so I can’t sue the guy or collect from his insurance company and its been since May.

  23. Anonymous says:

    Queen’s Highway is covered in burn out marks from one end to the other. RCIPS is apparently fully on board with a public highway being used for racing. Just a matter of time before a walker, jogger or cyclist is run down.

  24. Anonymous says:

    BVI has the right idea. If you drive drunk just go slow; the police won’t nick you for being obviously drunk, everyone else knows to give you a wide birth and if you visit the scenery no one gets hurt. Easy. The problem in Cayman is most people can barely drive sober.

  25. Rodney says:

    Unfortunately, the Police Commissioner seems unwilling or unable to really address the situation and have a joined up collaborative approach with other agencies to finally reverse the driving shambles here….instead, it’s like a householder with a seriously leaking water pipe in the property and their ‘response’ is to buy more mops to clear up the water.

  26. Anonymous says:

    I drove on 7mb around known brunch ending times on Sunday didn’t see one police….

  27. A-non-Caymanian says:

    Or… Maybe the cops could act like they REALLY MEAN to Go To Town on these @#$%^& Speeders

    • Anonymous says:

      Probably because they aren’t the ones causing all the crashes?

    • Anonymous says:

      I have posted this message probably 20 times over the years. There is a crew that races the loop on the ETH bypass between Yacht Club and Batabano Road every Sunday between 3-4 pm, literally a quarter mile from the WB Police Station. I call 911 and they tell me they are sending a car, send it it where I have no idea. But it is the same offenders every weekend. How hard can it be?

  28. Anonymous says:

    How about you consistently and rigorously enforce our laws RCIP? All day, every day. That would help.

    P.S. this is an issue of your own making. You supervised our descent into chaos, refusing to enforce overt breaches of our laws for more than a decade. Your words don’t mean very much anymore. Such a shame.

  29. Anonymous says:

    They need to be out there 24/7 north, south, east and west. A bit of zero tolerance would go a long way and make so much revenue for the service to fund more officers and enforcement equipment.

  30. Anonymous says:

    Nothing changes. I saw this morning another car hit the wall at Public Beach. How hard can it be to stay on the road?

  31. Anonymous says:

    You people can’t drive or drink. Hopeless.

    • Anonymous says:

      “You people”. To whom are you referring?

    • Anonymous says:

      Yeh and you are a superior driver until your imaginative car on railtoad tracks leaves the road at high speed. FYI, these are dumbass drivers who say the same thing after the last 200 have thought the same thing and found themselves on the road to hell.

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