Jensen La Vende

Se­nior Re­porter

A man who is al­leged to have been tar­get­ing el­der­ly res­i­dents of a Hous­ing De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion (HDC) hous­ing scheme, is one of nine men held un­der a pre­ven­ta­tive de­ten­tion or­der (PDO).

Ack­el Fran­cis, al­so known as “Ack­el Patrick” of Build­ing No 204, Sev­enth Av­enue, Orop­une Gar­dens, Pi­ar­co, is de­scribed by au­thor­i­ties as a foot sol­dier in a gang op­er­at­ing in the area.

“The ICG has ac­cess to a cache of firearms and am­mu­ni­tion. The de­tainee, who is a foot sol­dier for the ICG and oth­ers, is en­gaged in drug traf­fick­ing, mon­ey laun­der­ing, tip­ping off, vi­o­lent at­tacks on res­i­dents, with a fo­cus on el­der­ly res­i­dents and un­law­ful oc­cu­pa­tion of HDC units. The de­tainee and oth­ers in­tend to im­mi­nent­ly es­ca­late these ac­tiv­i­ties to ex­pand gang ter­ri­to­ry and are tar­get­ing res­i­dents for fur­ther vi­o­lent at­tacks,” the PDO said.

The oth­er de­tainees in­clude a prison of­fi­cer, iden­ti­fied as Dami­an John­son, of Mal­oney. He is ac­cused of be­ing “a key fa­cil­i­ta­tor and ac­tor in the traf­fick­ing of con­tra­band and pro­hib­it­ed ar­ti­cles in a prison.”

He is al­so ac­cused of be­ing ac­tive­ly in­volved in the traf­fick­ing of pro­hib­it­ed ar­ti­cles in­to a cor­rec­tion­al fa­cil­i­ty, and fa­cil­i­tat­ing the ex­pan­sion of gangs with­in the prison sys­tem, desta­bil­is­ing the se­cu­ri­ty of the prison sys­tem and pas­sage of in­for­ma­tion from in­car­cer­at­ed in­di­vid­u­als to ex­ter­nal ac­tors, there­by in­creas­ing the threat to the pub­lic.

Last month, prison of­fi­cer Keron Lewis was de­tained un­der a de­ten­tion or­der. Au­thor­i­ties al­leged that Lewis act­ed as a fa­cil­i­ta­tor in co­or­di­nat­ing com­mu­ni­ca­tion and crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ties be­tween in­car­cer­at­ed in­di­vid­u­als and ex­ter­nal as­so­ciates.

The nine men were or­dered to be de­tained by Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Roger Alexan­der be­tween April 30 and May 9, and were to be held at the East­ern Cor­rec­tion­al Re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion Cen­tre in San­ta Rosa, Ari­ma.

The oth­er de­tainees are al­so linked to al­leged or­gan­ised crim­i­nal net­works in Ari­ma, Tu­na­puna, Clax­ton Bay, San Fer­nan­do, Mal­oney, Carlsen Field and the North Coast.

Among them is Mark Mo­hammed, of Carlsen Field, who is ac­cused of in­volve­ment in home in­va­sions in the Cen­tral Dis­trict and pos­ses­sion of a firearm, with in­tel­li­gence sug­gest­ing planned fur­ther at­tacks.

Bri­an “Cheese” Samuel is al­so de­scribed as be­ing linked to an or­gan­ised crim­i­nal net­work in­volved in gang ac­tiv­i­ty and re­tal­ia­to­ry vi­o­lence in Ari­ma.

Ker­ron Ro­main, al­so known as “Do­minic” and “Say­to,” is al­leged to be the leader of an or­gan­ised crime group op­er­at­ing in Tu­na­puna and ac­cused of ex­tor­tion, firearms traf­fick­ing and threats to kill, with plans to es­ca­late vi­o­lence in pub­lic spaces.

An­oth­er de­tainee was Keron Bap­tiste, of Clax­ton Bay, who is linked to the al­leged re­moval of a large cache of firearms from a mu­nic­i­pal po­lice sta­tion.

Mean­while, Akeem Joseph, of La Ro­maine, Dy­lon Tay­lor, al­so known as “Tall­man,” of Blan­chisseuse, and Kendell Mc­Clatchie, al­so known as “Bob­by,” were sup­pos­ed­ly linked to vi­o­lent or­gan­ised or in­for­mal crime groups in­volved in firearms traf­fick­ing, home in­va­sions and shoot­ings.