Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley is de­fend­ing his ear­ly morn­ing cor­rob­o­ra­tion of the al­leged po­lice killing of five peo­ple in Trou Macaque, Laven­tille, on Thurs­day night. The po­lice claimed the five men, in­clud­ing two teenagers, were killed in an ex­change of gun­fire but eye­wit­ness­es have of­fered a con­flict­ing sto­ry.

Hours af­ter the shoot­ing, Row­ley is­sued an of­fi­cial state­ment con­demn­ing the “mis­guid­ed ac­tiv­i­ty” of the young men.

His ear­ly morn­ing state­ment, is­sued at 3.30 am, was crit­i­cised on so­cial me­dia as peo­ple ques­tioned why the Prime Min­is­ter would make such a de­fin­i­tive state­ment with­out ev­i­dence or an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the mat­ter. At the time, his state­ments were based sole­ly on the po­lice ac­count.

Asked about whether he was stand­ing by his ini­tial state­ment af­ter the men’s fam­i­lies chal­lenged the po­lice ac­count of what oc­curred, Row­ley, in a text mes­sage ex­change with Guardian Me­dia, said, “My of­fice is­sued an of­fi­cial state­ment at the first op­por­tu­ni­ty. The rea­son why I knew is be­cause I am, as Prime Min­is­ter, chair­man of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil. I am al­ways at work, night or day.”

But res­i­dents who wit­nessed the in­ci­dent just af­ter 9 pm on Thurs­day claimed the group of young men were un­armed and play­ing cards when they were con­front­ed by of­fi­cers at the back of a house.

Ac­cord­ing to po­lice re­ports, mem­bers of the In­ter-Agency Task Force (IATF) Strike Team killed five men dur­ing a shootout. Ini­tial re­ports said just be­fore 9 pm, the five men al­leg­ed­ly at­tempt­ed to rob a res­i­dent while the IATF unit was on pa­trol in the area. The IATF chal­lenged the men and a shootout oc­curred. All five men were hit and sub­se­quent­ly tak­en to hos­pi­tal where they died. An of­fi­cer was al­so hit dur­ing the al­leged gun­fight but his bul­let­proof vest saved his life.

Row­ley’s state­ment con­demned the loss of life but was crit­i­cal of the “mis­guid­ed ac­tiv­i­ty” of the young men.

“The loss of any cit­i­zen’s life, through vi­o­lence, is par­tic­u­lar­ly trau­mat­ic for any fam­i­ly and com­mu­ni­ty where it oc­curs. This emo­tion is mul­ti­plied many fold when young men arm them­selves and en­gage law en­force­ment of­fi­cers,” Row­ley said.

“This mis­guid­ed ac­tiv­i­ty al­ways has the po­ten­tial to end in un­speak­able tragedy for all in­volved, of­fi­cers and civil­ians. To­day’s news of five lives be­ing lost dur­ing a fire­fight be­tween law en­force­ment of­fi­cers and civil­ians brings us to such a place.”

He added, “Once again I ap­peal to all our young men who see op­por­tu­ni­ty through the pow­er of the il­le­gal firearm, to think again and grasp the oth­er op­por­tu­ni­ties which the coun­try of­fers to all its cit­i­zens, re­wards which are as­sured if we em­brace our na­tion­al watch­words of DIS­CI­PLINE, PRO­DUC­TION and TOL­ER­ANCE. There is no good end to bad deeds, bad com­pa­ny and a life of crime. Our coun­try de­serves bet­ter but to ac­com­plish that goal we all have to want it and com­mit to work to­wards it. Law en­force­ment can­not do it alone.”