Police visibility needed: Guinness

KILLINGS in Transgogol, Madang can be stopped if there is daily police presence, says Northern Command Assistant Police Commissioner (ACP) Peter Guinness.
Guinness said in any crime hotspot areas, police visibility could deter criminals.
He said although the Madang police had been trying to maintain a presence in the area, the killings had continued.
He said authorities, including law enforcement, needed to carry out community awareness with the people to find out reasons for the deaths that had occurred in the Transgogol area over the past 12 months.
Guinness said the nature of the killings was also unusual and needed investigating.
“It is not like other ordinary killings where somebody kills a person and leaves. At Transgogol when a person is killed, the deceased’s body is then cut up or some of the body parts are removed and taken away. This is unusual. What is the motive behind this and what are they (killers) trying to tell the people? We have to find out the root cause of the killings.”
Guinness said people in the Transgogol area needed to work with the police by providing information and helping them instead of remaining uncooperative.
He called on local leaders as well as the local MPs and provincial administration to help police address the situation in Transgogol. Guinness said the relatives of the deceased and other witness were reluctant to talk to the police because they feared being killed themselves.
“We must not sit down and see our own people being killed like this.
“We must find ways to stop it.”
Attempts to get comments from Madang Open MP Bryan Kramer and Madang Governor Peter Yama on the matter were unsuccessful.