Training premium in new ‘Juvie’ Justice programme

Training will be premium for the success of the Juvenile Justice programme Deputy Director
Joan Ann Edghill-Stuart said.
Edghill-Stuart, who has a passion for children, said law enforcement personnel must be familiar
with new requirements of the juvenile initiative.
“With the Juvenile Justice Programme, we want to begin by executing a major training for our
police officers. We have found that many of the officers are unable to deal with conflict issues
and it’s important to note that they should know where they can divert because diversion can
take place at the police station or at the court also,” the Deputy Director explained.
Edghill-Stuart anticipates that the robust training will take place late next month targeting law
enforcement officials including senior ranks of the Guyana Police Force (GPF) deemed critical
for the success of the Juvenile Justice Department.
The Deputy Director said several key local agencies and stakeholders will benefit from the
training programme. These include the Child Care and Protection Agency (CCPA) and the
Probation Department of the Ministry of Social Protection, Toshaos, various non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) and other local institutions.
The training schemes await the activation of the Juvenile Justice Committee Edghill-Stuart said.
“We have the committee it’s just for it to be implemented. We already confirmed everything
with Ms Halley from the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) Headquarters with regards to
the police training,” she said.
“We will also be training several Toshaos because as you may know that because of Guyana’s
topography, it is practically difficult to have police officers placed everywhere, so the Toshaos
operate as police officers in several communities and they too would be engaged in the training
as engaging various stakeholders in the training is important” she explained.

Continuing she said: “We see that in the absence of police officers in several hinterland
communities that the Toshaos play a pivotal role in addressing crime and police-related matters,
so it is important that in our effort to ensure that in the training being provided to police officers
that the Toshaos also are part of that training because they too have a very important role to
play”.
Under the new Juvenile Act wandering is removed as a criminal offence. The Juvenile Justice
Act has also repealed several other offences, Edghill-Stuart disclosed, adding that she will soon
embark on a wide-ranging public sensitisation effort.
“Other than training, I will also be responsible for the administration of all the Open and Closed
and residential facilities. Importantly, before this Act we only had the NOC (New Opportunity
Corps) which is in Essequibo where we would house juvenile when they come in, now we are
trying to have different facilities when they come in to house different juveniles,” she said.
Since the new law stresses reintegration, education and rehabilitation of the juvenile offender,
Edghill-Stuart said the state of immurement would be based on the nature of the offense(s)
committed.
“Now if you have committed a summary offense you do not need to be placed in a closed
facility as it’s a lesser offense So in fulfilling the mandate of reintegration, education and
rehabilitation where ever a juvenile is placed we always at all times want to ensure that the
juvenile’s education is progressing, probably learning a trade or something to that effect as we
just don’t want to have them locked away and when it’s time for them to be reintegrated into
society they are just lost. We want to be able to have a smooth flow into society again so whilst
doing that I would be managing these facilities to making sure that they are streamlined to ensure
especially with the Human Rights, with the different principles that we have to fulfil some of the
different things that we would be doing and assist with the different management of the
department.”
For now, the giant task is supervised by three dedicated persons: Edghill-Stuart. Andre
Gonsalves and William Boston.
“It’s just the three of us for now and it’s a lot of work,”. Edghill-Stuart said.

Joan Ann Edghill-Stuart is the Deputy Director of Juvenile Justice (Administration).