The Gun Violence Prevention Office (OGVP) appeared before the Senate Government Operations, Veterans Affairs and Consumer Protection Committee on Monday, two weeks after leadership from the V.I. Police Department released a video to address a spate of gun violence and killings.
Though Monday’s update followed a recent uptick in homicides territory-wide, OGVP Executive Director Tony Emanuel said that homicides have decreased “by as much as 55 percent” since 2019, when 64 were recorded. The Source, which does not include suicides or vehicular homicides on its homicide list, has recorded 33 homicides year-to-date — a roughly 48.5 percent decrease.
“The data across the country shows that jurisdictions that experience significant decreases in crime usually creep back up. The work and outreach programs hopefully keep it from reaching previous numbers,” Emanuel said during prepared testimony.
Emanuel called recent killings and suicides a reason for concern but defended the work done by the OGVP’s six-person team.
“We still have more to improve on and more people to reach, but clearly the data shows that we are making a difference in the community,” he said.
The Gun Violence Prevention Office was established in 2022 under the Office of the Governor. Emanuel said Monday that the OGVP collaborates with other government and law enforcement agencies, nonprofit organizations and businesses to curb gun violence through education and outreach.
The office has been involved in more than a hundred events focused on violence prevention and delivered antiviolence or anti-bullying presentations to approximately five thousand students territory-wide, Emanuel said. The OGVP also provides training and seminars on a range of topics, including workplace violence, de-escalation, sexual harassment and conflict resolution. During the last year, Emanuel said the office worked directly with at-risk students and operated an after-school program for youths from two housing communities.
Emanuel also highlighted the work of the office’s “violence interrupters,” one of whom “has intervened in over 15 incidents where there was serious conflict and death was imminent.” Emanuel noted that there were no homicides during the Crucian Christmas Festival for two years in a row and none during the St. Thomas Carnival for the first time in three years.
“When we go to the turfs and we talk to the young men about their conflict with somebody else, you know, we try to get them to see that to kill somebody because they owe you money or stole your drugs is certainly not the way to handle conflict,” he said.
Monday’s committee meeting was sparsely attended during the OGVP’s testimony, and only Sens. Carla Joseph, who chairs the committee, and Alma Francis Heyliger questioned the testifiers. At one point, Francis Heyliger asked Emanuel to address the flow of firearms into the territory.
Emanuel said the office doesn’t have a law enforcement arm but noted that guns or gun parts are frequently sent to the U.S. Virgin Islands through the mail. Others are brought in through the airport, he said, adding that he wasn’t sure “if we have the stomach” to search every container and every bag arriving in the territory.
“And that would prevent tourism,” he said. “And it could affect a lot of different things in different ways. If I had my way, yes, we would do that — but at the same time, people would probably fire me.”
Joseph lauded the OGVP’s efforts but asked that they bring more data to their next Senate hearing. In a call with The Source Monday, Emanuel acknowledged that gun violence prevention work is difficult to put into numbers.
“How do you quantify that because that one child decided not to have a fight with the other kid, that means that they didn’t go back to their neighborhoods and continue the thing and have a shooting,” he asked.
Sens. Carla J. Joseph, Javan E. James Sr., Samuel Carrión, Dwayne M. DeGraff, Alma Francis Heyliger, Donna A. Frett-Gregory, Kenneth L. Gittens, and Milton E. Potter attended Monday’s hearing.
