We must not glorify crime
INSINUATIONS in another section of the print media that the death of the country's most wanted criminal, Linden London, has the romantic ring of the Jesse James or Al Capone saga are not amusing. The Sunday Stabroek, for reasons of its own, portrayed "Mr London" as a victim whose story would be featured in books. The Guyanese people need to be told this story, also. Not in song or poems. They need to see the stark score sheet of crimes for which Mr London, also called `Blackie', was wanted by the security forces. He was, no one would deny, a ruthless and dangerous criminal. Yet there are other elements in the electronic media who are trying to politicise the demise of London and, again, to sow seeds of racial hatred. They and their political cronies must not for one moment underestimate the intelligence of the electorate who will see through their antics and their opportunism. For them Judgement Day will come when fresh elections are held. This opportunistic alliance with criminals will be a short-lived romance. There are also the skeptics who are quick to indict the security forces for cutting down the wanted criminal in an exchange of gunfire. Had the criminal escaped, as he had done on previous occasions, they would still have mercilessly attacked the security forces for incompetence. After the smoke had settled at Eccles, some advanced an assumption that London was about to surrender peacefully. But we too can let our imagination run wild and situate the wanted bandit in a situation where his hands were concealed behind his back. What we cannot imagine was whether or not he had grenades concealed in his hands ready to release them in a final blast of glory. He had done that before when he was confronted by a Police party. Who knew if that had happened at Eccles what harm would have come to our security personnel? But our brave men in uniform would have been blamed nonetheless as being stupid for trusting an armed bandit after he had fired at them, with intent to kill, for an entire night. And the critics would have extolled the glory of the criminal. The critics have also tried to put a wedge between the soldiers and the Police, claiming the Army wanted him alive while the Police wanted him dead. We have it on good source that both the Army and the Police were agreed that the criminal who had engaged the security forces in battle should have been taken out. Both soldiers and the Police did what they had to do in a combat situation. And they should be commended. The pathetic aspect of this episode is that the anti-establishment critics and skeptics, and political opportunists, have been trying to drum up sentiments that the security forces had shot and killed an unarmed and perhaps innocent man. We wish to point to the `rap sheet' of the late Linden London which shows his sordid and bloody trail of violent crimes and killings in more than a decade. London was wanted for the murder of Jonathan Belle and Raul Casimero in the Upper Potaro River and Police Corporal Richard Faikal during the $50M robbery at the Anna Regina branch of the Guyana National Cooperative Bank. In one of his more dangerous skirmishes the bandit threw a grenade at four Policemen who tried to arrest him at Kaieteur in the Upper Potaro. That was an attempted murder. The litany of armed robberies, including the daring daylight America Street and National Insurance Scheme heists are too well known to be repeated. So too are the gun spree in the streets of Georgetown and the search drama in the Mocha canefields. Today, the body of Linden London is to be laid to rest. In a sense he knew his end would come. According to a relative, London had asked that his death be not mourned. He reportedly wanted a `soul' funeral. It is truly unfortunate that a once resourceful person who had served in the Army should have pursued a career of crime. His victims were many and the scars of those crimes would be suffered for a long time. His was not a legacy of heroism and those who try to exploit his death for narrow ends would contribute to the glorification of crime. We should all hope that a page of senseless violence in our nation's history has been closed and that we should learn from the lesson of London's escapades that violence begets violence.
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