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Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police
"We do have an uptick in gang activity and over the past two weeks following the death of Brandon Baptist we have seen that the threat level in Belize City has increased and we have also deployed additional police officers on the ground and we are conducting daily operations in the Martin's area and then we saw with last weekend where Majestic Alley came into the fray where it is alleged that they were responsible for the shooting at Akeem Smith so that has now stretched our operations to the Northside. Again, we don't want to leave any area open for gangs to be able to execute the intended acts and so we're doing the best we can to contain the gang violence for now."

Reporter:
"It is stretching you out so thin that it leads to constriction in other areas because I remember we were in court one day and the head prosecution, the chief of prosecution said that to transport people from prison was a difficulty because of all your operations."

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police
"Of course, we are stretched extremely thin and everybody wants police, even the ones who don't like police want police now like Jules Vasquez. [laughs]. But yeah we are stretched really thin. We also have to look at the high court for security, we do have a number of judges who lack security and I have instructed Mr Romero to provide security for those judges, that is going to take another 8 police officers out of daily operations to provide security for judges but the security of the judges is important, we must ensure our judges who are performing such duty in our high courts, that they get the level of security that they deserve so we're doing as best as we can to make sure they are safe as well."