ComPol Commends Department for Reducing Murder Rate

As Commissioner of Police Chester Williams gets ready to step down, he takes a moment to reflect on the department’s achievements during his tenure. Williams, who joined the force at just seventeen years old, has worked tirelessly to overcome challenges and rise through the ranks to serve the people of Belize. He shared that while there are many accomplishments he’s proud of, the significant decrease in Belize’s murder rate stands out as a major success. Here’s more on that.

 

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“We certainly did a lot. If we look right across from this building, you can see the Compstat office. I’m extremely proud of that achievement. There are several things I can list out, but I will leave that for when the official day comes. But one of the most things I’m proud of is the fact that we were able to bring the murder count below a hundred for two consecutive years. Again,  those are many lives saved, right? And if it is that we save one life we save, we would have done well, but we saved many lives I can say. And so I am extremely grateful for that. Another issue I’m proud of is that we are able to reduce the amount of complaints against the police brutality cases.  We reduce that tremendously, which means that we as a department have done a lot in terms of human rights training of our officers to make them understand that we must respect the rights and dignity of people. And while we’ll never reach that studio. We’ll have no complaints at all. I believe that we have done a lot in terms of making sure that we are able to reduce it tremendously, so I’m proud of that as well.”