Two senior police officers have been dismissed. On Wednesday November ninth, Inspectors Oscar Puga and Albert Kelly appeared before the Security Services Commission on a number of charges.
Kelly, who had 19 years of service was accused of multiple acts of dishonesty. First, he was accused of taking $1,092 in cash from a man detained for burglary. According to details printed in The Cayo Star on Friday, the man claims that when he was released Kelly never gave him back the money and when he kept pursuing him for it, he took him to a Indian man who gave him $300. He claims Kelly told him he would repay the rest, but he never did and that's when he took his complaint to the Internal Affairs Department.
Kelly was also accused of borrowing $1,300 from a Burrell Boom resident and not returning it. He was also accused of mishandling $300 raised by Ladyville police for a Christmas party. And if all that wasn't enough, Kelly is further accused of running up a $4,000 phone bill at the Ladyville Station after he had been transferred.
With all this trouble, Kelly tried to resign at the end of August of this year, in which case he would have gotten all his benefits. But the Commissioner did not accept his resignation, opting to go to the Commission. On Wednesday that Commission ruled that he should be dismissed from the department, thus losing all those benefits.
Inspector Puga didn't have quite the rap sheet that Kelly did, but the offence he was accused of was no less serious. On February 11, of this year Puga was sent to recover $4,000 in cash from the robbery of Provident Bank. Puga was supposed to hand over the money to the investigating officer, Sergeant Alden Dawson, but he never did. According to the Cayo Star, Dawson asked Puga repeatedly to and over the money, but he did not.
An incredible six months later, Puga's Officer Commanding Chester Williams instructed Puga to hand over the money and the report, according to the Cayo Star, Puga indicated that he would repay the money. He didn't and that's when the investigation against him started. In view of that evidence that he mishandled and possibly misappropriated an exhibit, the Commission also judged that he should be dismissed. And while, there's great disgrace for these officers, it seems blame must be shared with the department which showed no urgency in dealing with serious appearances of corrupt behavior, in fact in both cases, it appeared the senior command did all it could to allow the officers to correct their corrupt acts and then the whole thing would have been swept under the table.
