Premier to hold ‘presser’ in wake of ‘horrific’ shooting
(CNS): MPs and RCIPS representatives are meeting behind closed doors this afternoon to discuss the shocking shooting at the Ed Bush stadium in West Bay last night in which at least seven people were wounded. After that meeting, scheduled to begin at 1:30pm, Premier Juliana O’Connor-Connolly and senior police officers are expected to host a press conference at 3:00pm. Some 15 hours after a gunman fired around a dozen shots into the crowd at a football match attended by hundreds of people, including children, police have revealed almost no details of the incident and there is no indication of any arrests.
As parliament met on Monday, the premier issued a short statement announcing the closed-door meeting and the proposed press conference.
“I, like the rest of our community, am deeply troubled by the horrific shooting incident, which took place at the Ed Bush Stadium last night… leaving several persons being treated for serious injuries at the George Town Hospital,” she said. “While our law enforcement and intelligence professionals continue to gather the facts, we appeal to members of the community who witnessed the incident to come forward and provide information. Anyone with information is encouraged to contact the RCIPS.”
She explained that she had convened an emergency meeting with all relevant government officials, followed by the media briefing.
“This level of violence is not normal in our beloved Cayman Islands and will not be tolerated. The government fully supports the RCIPS and all its efforts to ensure a safe and secure Cayman Islands,” she said, adding that the action taken by the police, first responders, medical professionals and many bystanders who charged into danger and saved lives was appreciated.
Describing the incident as “brazen violence”, she said that the CIG “conveys our deepest sympathy and fervent prayer to all those affected”.
Opposition Leader Roy McTaggart said the PPM members stood in support of the government’s efforts to bring the right people to justice. “Everyone is saddened, and we are all deeply concerned with regard to the events that unfolded last night,” he said as he offered his backing to the police and called for calm to be restored.
Home Affairs Minister Sabrina Turner offered her thanks to the emergency services on the scene last night. “Our heart goes out to the victims, to the country as a whole. But when you look at the front-line staff of all of our uniform services and especially the toll that it takes on our medical personnel who actually run into danger… it speaks volumes,” she said.
See the video of the incident below (from social media):
- Fascinated
- Happy
- Sad
- Angry
- Bored
- Afraid
It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong.
Thomas Sowell
If you want people to come forward remove the Jamaican officers from the force. Then people will trust the RCIPS more.
Jamaicans don’t hold any special monopoly on indiscretion. If that thesis were true, how could $25 million in street drugs walk out of a secured evidence locker inside a barbed-wired police station, without CCTV working, or anyone seeing anything? It would take a parade of people to carry that off, as well as a tip from a trusted elected Cayman politician that was privy to the seizure and knew where it went, and positioned to muzzle any investigation.
Why was it suggested just a few weeks ago that politicians receive personal security – did somebody know something then?
They just want to give jobs to their good buddies who will drive them around, run errands and keep their mouths shut.
An art perfected by Mac.
Just keep them away from fax machines..right Mac..?
The press release was a joke, the cayman gov has no integrity, no soul. For them its a job and all they want is to make money. Don’t forget that the Cayman Gov and the police force are registered companies just like most countries in the world. Its all business, when you go diving in the rabbit hole you see the world from a different view, all this ”pray for them/me, god take the wheel” is absolute nonsense batshit. I will be very surprised if the shooter ever gets caught. The people of Cayman haven’t trusted the gov in many many years because they don’t care for the people and wether we like it or not we dont care about our selves! How is it that we can haver a traffic jam in order to get a piece of cancer chicken at poppeys but no traffic jam for better living standards, better opportunities ect ect , we should be outside the gov building in the masses not outside friggin poppeyes… i doubt things will ever change!
The assailant was hiding in the bush.
New worry for the public: sniper fire from concealed gunmen.
And in a piddling little place like Grand Cayman, with draconian gun laws, the powers that be cannot get gangs and gun crime under control. To hear them tell it and from the incidents reported, you would swear this is as big a challenge to police as Los Angeles. (Hmmm…? Maybe to them, it is.)
Draconian gun laws? We do not need nor want to be riddled with guns and the related violence like America!!!
Quite. I love shooting but my enjoyment does not trump public safety. There are too many morons out there. Our gun laws are not draconian enough.
@11:28 @ 12:06:
Having draconian gun laws on the books does almost nothing to prevent proliferation of gun violence.
If a segment of society is bent on violence, and enforcement and preventative measures are ineffective, even in the face of draconian gun laws, gun crime will proliferate. Very nearby case in point: Jamaica.
Having a large segment of society in possession of firearms does not invariably men that gun violence will proliferate. Cases in point: Switzerland, Norway, and Iceland have high rates of private gun ownership per capita; however, they have among the lowest rates of gun violence.
The problem is not guns, it is people.
Regardless of the law, people with a propensity for violence will acquire guns and do bad things. Case in point: Cayman Islands. Look for the problem here to get far worse.
So, Jeff Webb and cronies decimated Cayman football from what it used to be decades ago, now the Premier will ban games for a week because of criminals the security forces can’t control??
Why penalize football? What’s next, banning Taste of Cayman and other public events???
Morons in charge!!
Did you listen to the conference? CIFA Executives are off island and they made that decision together given the need to have discussions on how to move forward for the safety of players, staff and spectators going forward. Not to mention the fact that innocent players were injured and traumatized? Give people time to recover ffs.
26 @ 4:03pm – “Out of many, we are one people”. With the apparent lack of originality and ignorance of quoting Jamaica’s motto, our “Premier” has confirmed our sell-out to controlling Jamaicans!!! Morons in charge!!
….or maybe it was NOT an oversight??
that’s also the motto for the US
you can find it written in Latin on their dollar
Or as they say in West Bay and Bodden Tow.
Out of one, many people.
Out of Many, One People headed into the bin.
if it wasn’t for DART and others, Cayman would have been sunk, especially after the status fiasco.
However, the flow of guns with drugs(not mentioned at the presser) is the work of groups/gangs.
Security at Camana Bay now became justified to be armed.
Cayman is gone.
“This level of violence … will not be tolerated”
How so?
What are you doing to show it is not tolerated (other than begging for a witness)?
What will you do if/when it happens again at a different location?
“We will not tolerate this” is a bold claim sure, but how exactly is the government and RCIPS following up that statement?
about as useful as most of the covid press briefings….zzzzzz
What do we expect when our government consist of members that once rode with these seem bandits.
At what point do we ask the UK mothership for assistance here? The gun scourge has been allowed to continue for too long now. Send in the professionals to clean up house.
‘Send in the professionals to clean up house.’ Yes, to the house of politriks!
I really hope I’m not the only one who caught our premier Julie saying “out of many, we are one people”. If you didn’t know, that is Jamaica’s national motto. I really couldn’t believe she said that during a press about a mass shooting.
Were you hoping for originality? Ju Ju has a marginally higher IQ compared to Job Jon. Even if the perp is caught, and charged with 7x attempted murder, how May years do you think they’ll actually do? Discussions will inevitably ensue but We were once a dependency of Jamaica, now that we have adopted the most vile parts of their culture there’s no going back.
People’s expectations are as high as the clouds our vacant, apathetic leaders are floating on. If anyone thinks the situation will be managed to the point of having only one gun crime per year, like it was 30 years ago, then they’re on the same cloud as most of our politicians.
We were NEVER a dependency of Jamaica. Spouting that crap is lazy, inaccurate, history. Cayman was a Dependency of the Crown Colony of Jamaica. In other words overseen and controlled by the British. You know, when Jamaica was the safest country on earth.
Between 1863 to 1959, the Cayman Islands was treated “as if” it was a dependency of Jamaica, which itself was a British territory until its independence in 1962.
Jamaica pretty much left the Cayman Islands alone to look after itself.
Britain left Cayman to look after itself… NOT Jamaica.
Revisionist history is my favourite subject.
None because they will be found not guilty.
If we were a dependency of Jamaica we’d now be a barren Parish 15.
thank God we were both UK territories,at least until they went looking for the Good Life, but we stayed with England!
But our politicians are now dependent on their Jamaican voters.
THEY are now a dependency of Jamaica.
Truer words never spoken!
Believe it because the politicians want Cayman to be just like Jamaica and it certainly appears they are achieving their goal.
26 @ 4:03pm – “Out of many we are one people”. With the apparent lack of originality and ignorance of quoting Jamaica’s motto, our “Premier” has confirmed our sell-out to controlling Jamaicans!!!
Morons in charge!!
Now you can see clearly exactly what Derek Byrne and The Police Service Commission have left us with. Naive clueless policing.
“crime remains stable across deez tree islands” zzZzZzzzZzzzZZz
😄
and his deputy is now the COP.
So either an inefficient deputy or Mr. Walton just sat back and closed his eyes.
you said not me.
All football banned for a week or so. Yes, football is the root cause of this problem…
Wait for it, she might label it the devil’s game, bring in the exorcist!
Not only are the RCIPS not up to it, but nor is their nominal boss the governor with her idiotic platitudes a few weeks ago, no doubt written for her by the commissioner. She lives in a government house/administration building/charity galas bubble and clearly has no idea of the mayhem going on around her – not just the guns but the appalling state of the traffic, driving standards, etc. Scofflaws the length and breadth of the island, many of whom should know better.
For as long as the governor listens to nobody except her advisers, the politicians, the civil service and the commissioner, nothing will change. The whole rotten, incompetent structure needs radical revision.
Also referring to them as the R – Sips, didn’t give me a warm and fuzzy feeling………..
I’m calling 3:23pm as the actual start time.
Thoughts and prayers.
Yes, they’ll help.
Hasn’t helped the US!!
pity we don’t have a real media presence anymore for real journalists to ask hard questions (if allowed)…
just another day in wonderland.
@2:34:
Wendy was cut off mid-question by the moderator.
*CNS* this fact, alone, seems worth an article….
wow…our brave premier somehow now has the guts to hold a press conference.
will the press be allowed ask questions after her carefully prepared statement full of bland cliches…?
I wasn’t there, but how is it that the shooter escaped? And that nobody noticed who it was?
do you think life is some sort of video game or Sherlock Holmes movie? you hear gunshots you move immediately in the opposite direction as fast as possible. Nobody is stopping to see who the shooter is because by time you find him you might not get a chance to give the useless RCIPS his description.
That is not true in all instances.
Case in point: At the very recent Kansas City mass shooting, bystanders chased and tackled a suspected shooter and detained him until police could take him into custody.
There were only 300 people there, but an Elite and Academy club crowd where nobody sees the tainted ref calls, or any other serial irregularities. Their leaderships also had front row seats to the CIFA fraud and embezzlement.