Peta-Gaye Clachar/Staff Photographer
Leighton McKnight, lieutenant governor for Kiwanis division 23E, lifts up seven-year-old Kaydia Graham from Linstead Primary and Junior High School at the Kiwanis clubs' press conference condemning violence against children at the Medallion Hall in St Andrew, yesterday.

Petrina Francis, Staff Reporter

Amid the growing levels of violence against the nation's children, Sharian Baker, governor of Key Club, yesterday warned criminals who continued to prey on children that the blood of the innocent was on their hands.

"I beg of you people who are committing these unscrupulous acts of violence against our children, to desist from doing so. The blood of the innocent is on your hands," Baker said during a press conference called by the Kiwanis Club to denounce the recent flare-up of violence against our children.

"The youths of today have been reduced to mere preys of the vicious predators mercilessly attacking and ripping apart the lives of our young people."

Constant fear

She stated that children lived in constant fear of being attacked. "The joy of childhood is being marred by these horrendous, callous and inhumane acts against our children."

Baker, a St Andrew High School for Girls sixth-form student, said as children, they take the burden of fear into the classroom. This burden, she said, acts as a deterrent to learning "as we are edgy".

"I am a child. I am in need of protection. When you take away my life or that of my fellow youths, you are robbing this country of someone who could have made an impact on Jamaica."

Kiwanis Lieutenant Governor Leighton McKnight says Jamaica should hang its head in shame, as it relates to the lack of protection for our children.

"The island's over 2,500 Kiwanians register outrage, shock and condemnation of the continuing brutal attacks on our nation's children by certain heartless elements in the society," said McKnight.

It must stop

"As Kiwanians, we believe that these numbers clearly indicate that we are losing our soul as a nation. As a country, we should hang our heads in shame as it relates to the protection of our children. This madness must stop immediately," McKnight told the gathering at the Medallion Hall Hotel, St Andrew.

He also appealed to the police to act immediately on reports of missing children and abandon the risky 24-hour requirement. He also said individuals with information concerning the abuse of, or other attacks on children, to give information to the police.

The lieutenant governor also urged the authorities to move swiftly to implement a child-molester or abuser-registration system.

petrina.francis@gleanerjm.com