Disorderly, domestic related murders on the rise – Benn

While there has been an overall decrease in serious crimes for the year so far, law enforcement officials have recorded a rise in murders, with more occurrences of those that are disorderly and domestic related.

“There is a problem of domestic murders where our men kill their partners, mostly young, dysfunctional, insecure men and there are problems between young people of disorderly murders,” Minister of Home Affairs, Robeson Benn told reporters at the sidelines of an event on Thursday.

Having recognised the trend, the authorities are taking action to address the situation by implementing several initiative such as offering counselling and acting early on reports of threats.

“We are looking at dealing with that situation as we are upping the level with trying to mitigate, have counselling and have early reports of threats to persons in the communities,” Benn said.

Notwithstanding the rise in that particular type of offence, Benn highlighted that serious crime has been decreasing when compared to previous years.

“Over the last two years, three years, serious crime has gone down in Guyana.

“It went down 20 percent over two years and last year it won’t down 17 percent,” Benn said.

As of April 15, 2024, the Guyana Police Force has recorded a total of 40 murders.

Out of the total, 17 were disorderly and six were domestic related.

Other categories of murders include those which occurred during the course of a robbery and execution style killings.