SPECIAL REPORT

Baudinet frustrated with police and juveniles

June Baudinet plans to be the first to speak to the new Police Commissioner when he takes up office. For years, she has been frustrated with the efforts by police to catch and prosecute burglars of her accommodation.
The office at Baudinet’s villas in Arorangi was broken into just last week, with the whole wall panel ripped off.
“I recognize the weakness of the police,” says Baudinet, “I asked one of the lady police to take fingerprints off the wall and she replied to me – did you see any fingerprints on the wall.”
It’s comments like this that the new Police Commissioner will have to listen to when he gets the ear bashing from June.
“I think the police need to teach their staff to understand the importance of fingerprinting.”
She believes that the burglars in this latest incident are juveniles because they have been so in the past.
There are currently three young boys going to juvenile court at the end of this month, two of whom have admitted to a previous crime at the Raina Lagoon Villas where a suitcase was stolen from a tourist who had just arrived.
“This happened about four months ago, the problem was the suitcase contained the man’s medication, and we rushed him up to the hospital and they didn’t have any of the right medication.”
The boys had discarded the suitcase on the beach after rummaging through it, fortunately the medicine was still in there when it was discovered.
Like the Tepuka sewage situation, inability to prosecute juveniles is a problem that government is not really doing anything about.
“I want my friend the Prime Minister, also the Minister of Police to get off Capitol Hill and come down to the reality of our situation. This country is infected with a disease, where are the parents, the community, the churches, our leaders. Do we have to resort to putting an electric fence around our property and make us look like Papua New Guinea.”
June admits that as soon as people see the headline of this story they’ll be saying “there goes June again complaining and complaining.”
But June says that her place in Arorangi has been broken into 11 times and the police has done nothing. She also says that one time one of her staff members stole $65,000 worth of jewelry from her pearl shop, and because the staff was a niece of the then Police Commissioner and also the then Minister of Police she was never prosecuted.
June’s frustrations have risen to another level after being warned by travel agents representing her in the US that if the break ins continue they will stop sending tourist her way.
June believes that if the Cook Islands doesn’t do anything about respecting visitors and their property, we could lose them to Samoa who has only just opened up it’s country to tourism. Samoa is the next boom town, the Cook Islands is old news, it doesn’t have the culture and attractions that Samoa has, so it doesn’t help that our laws are lax.
She says that if it were allowed she will be the first to kick the arse of these kids. She says its so frustrating spending so much time and money on making your property nice, marketing it etc and then having a bunch of kids ruin it. She would like to see parents of these kids given counseling and held more responsible for the actions of their children.
- Jeane Matenga

Stopping juvenile crime

Suggestion 1: Update the law
According to Kapi, the real problem is that the law is weak and that a child under 16 years old cannot be convicted. The problem is further exasperated if the child is a multi-offender. Many of the kids going before the Juvenile Court have been there three to four times already.
This is a common problem with government in that other lesser important laws like the media bill get priority over a much needed juvenile crimes bill.
Kapi personally believes that there needs to be a harder punishment for second/third time offenders under 16 years of age. He recommends that community work be mandated for third time offenders where they have to wear a coloured vest and can be easily identified by the community.
Parents should also be prosecuted if they have initiated the crimes their children commit.

Suggestion 2: Follow Up
Kapi says that it is the responsibility of Social Welfare to check up on these kids. But the problem is that Henry is the only one in his department. He has to do all his own administration and field work. Plus, he has not been given a transport for field work and must borrow other section’s vehicles.
Kapi believes that if Henry is given someone to help him with the field work and some transport, the problem can be reduced.
Solution 3: Parents need to know their role
Unfortunately, police have had some experiences where the parents do not seem to care about their children’s whereabouts or behaviour. Parents need to understand that when you have children it is your duty to society to bring them up in a way that they will contribute positively to society. Children are not just things that live in your house which you can ignore. Parents of delinquents are obviously not coping well with parenthood and need to undergo training in how to parent.
Parents need to get their kids involved in sports groups or youth groups to keep them occupied as well as give them chores around the house.
And if a parent can’t handle their children then they should seek help.

Suggestion 4: Everyone to help
Kapi is insistent that everyone in society needs to play their role in helping children. He questions what are the churches, youth organizations, community groups and families doing to keep these children occupied. He believes many of these children are good children who are just bored and as a result are attracted to all the wrong things.
A useful idea would be to open up all the halls around the island with activities for the children. The next sitting of the juvenile court is on the 25th of this month.

Headlines : Times 201 21 May 2007
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