public safety

Criminal justice system incomplete

la prensa

crime scene investigation1107126

At a time when the country’s crime rate seems to exceed all official forecasts, the government is still behind in organizing and implementing a comprehensive policy of investigating crime.

The issue was the focus of a speech delivered yesterday by Aida Selles de Palacios, the director of the Institute of Criminology of the Universidad de Panamá, for whom there is no explanation of why the state has not followed through with such a policy.

The director was addressing an audience at the First International Congress of Criminology at the Museo Reina Torres de Araúz.

De Palacios acknowledged that some of the entities within the Governmental Pact for Justice, including the Universidad de Panamá, the Attorney General's Office and the Judicial Branch, are committed to a policy that institutionalizes criminology throughout the country, but noted that the program has “a long way to go."

De Palacios also highlighted the fact that the Executive Branch submitted a proposal to open discussions of a criminology policy, but that nothing every came of it.

"Much remains to be discussed in respect to a comprehensive policy and strategy. We have to keep striving to achieve it,” she said.

According to the criminology expert, the first thing that authorities need to understand that the crime’s occurring in the nation have evolved to such a degree that it can no longer be viewed in the manner that it was in the past.

On the contrary, she added, crime enforcement authorities must adopt a more urban and global perspective when addressing modern crimes.