Police should go easy on locking up MCO violators

Yes, most of us understand the frustration of the police when people keep travelling without reason, increasing the probability of getting and passing Covid-19 infections from and to others.

But it is not going to help the efforts in stopping the spread of the virus if we lock up violators all together and bring them to the court to face the music all handcuffed to each other. This is yet again another case of the police taking things too far in these tough times.

These are not hardened criminals that the police are dealing with. Most of them are very ordinary people confused about the situation and trying to cope as best as they can. Most of them have not had to deal with such movement restrictions in their lifetime.

To throw them into jail and to have them roughed up, handcuffed and put into police cells is a bit of an overkill in these times when people may just vent too much by being confined in their homes.

If you lock them up together in police cells all over the country, which are notorious for their crowding and their lack of hygiene, sometimes for days at a time, it is inevitable that if just one of them is a carrier all the others are going to get Covid-19 as well.

In effect what the police are doing by locking people up is ensuring that the very thing that they are trying to prevent – the spread of the virus – is actually facilitated by their operating procedures. The next cell for a Covid-19 outbreak may be a police cell if we don’t watch it.

Not just that, they are needlessly endangering themselves by arresting the violators, which often can only be done by force and physical contact, and then taking them to police stations. Every police officer in the station and others arrested are in danger if there is a carrier among them.

Surely there can be some way in which the procedures can be changed to ensure that the police do not endanger themselves and detainees by avoiding arrest in the first place. This is not the time for the standard operating procedure for dealing with criminals to prevail upon a civilian population.

This is not the time to deter by showing how tough you are but instead a time for exercising patience and tact to a confused, scared and inexperienced population which needs guidance more than anything else.

Here are some examples of arrests: A doctor jogging in a park in Penang. He was arrested when he said that there was no curfew. Some people who were playing football. A person for resisting an officer in the performance of his public duties – outside his own house. These indicate that the police may be just a tad too hasty and procedures need to be changed.

When you deal with ordinary civilians, not hardened criminals, it must always be the soft approach first. Look for the mitigating circumstances. Is there anyone else near the jogger? Is the jogger alone? Advise politely.

Is there an emergency that a person is attending to? Taking food to the aged is needed. I dare say in Malaysia sometimes you can’t get the needed supplies within 10km from your home. This kind of restriction is fine if the area is a hot spot, not if it is not.

What if soft approach doesn’t work?

If the soft approach does not work – in most instances it will work provided the police and enforcement people are polite and reasonable – then it is time to move on to the next step, which will still not need an arrest and incarceration.

Get the personal details of the offenders and issue a compound notice for them to come to the court to face charges. And instruct that they immediately turn back and go home if they have no valid reason to be around.

Remind them if they do not attend court, a warrant of arrest will be issued and they will not hesitate to send the police car to their house.

If after all this, the police or enforcement authorities cannot get the offender to go back home, then they should arrest the person, with reasonable force being used. But they need to have a protocol to do this which has to be worked out with Health Ministry officials.

This is to ensure that any chance of infection is minimised. There may be the need to use gloves, protective clothing, good quality masks. At the lock-up, it must be ensured that distancing is observed so there is less chance of infection. There may be the need to share lock-ups of different stations so that offenders don’t share cells.

But most likely, if the police were to observe the earlier measures, there will be very few arrests made. Even if such arrests are made, those involved can be given police bail and released without having to spend time in the lock-up.

Magistrates should not be too quick to jail miscreants as has happened to many recently. Instead community service as volunteer workers to control the pandemic such as food distribution during the crisis is a more creative deterrent and will help solve manpower constraints at the same time.

Such simple measures will be more effective in terms of curbing the virus and at the same time introduce more humane and considerate measures which are more suitable for a civilian population.

But it does require a change in mindset among some in the police who are more familiar with using harsher and more expedient measures meant for hardened criminals.

We all need to make changes and adjustments in these difficult circumstances which are likely to be with us for some time. And that includes the police as well.

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P GUNASEGARAM is editor of Focus Malaysia. - Mkini