Host of BVI Forum, Mr Edmund Maduro, asked, “Why do we want to teach our children to be criminals?”

The programme was aired last evening, January 26, 2013 on CBN television station and his guests were Superintendent St.Claire Armoury and Public Relations Officer Diane Drayton, both of the Royal Virgin Islands Police Force (RVIPF).

The panel was at the time discussing the dangers and consequences for persons thinking of becoming involved in illegal gun possession. Supt. Armoury also discussed with the host, the issue of a young child encountering the weapon and causing damage to themselves. “What is going to happen to my family?” Maduro asked.

When encountering a firearm in the home, “most children will report it to mommy and daddy,” Mr Maduro said, “a lot will not and they will go playing with it and when you look they destroy their whole selves.”

Supt. Armoury agreed with the host and said, “That child who plays with a firearm, should somebody else come into the room, especially mother or father or older sibling, becomes startled because they hear somebody coming in, they may have seen a gun on television before and here it is somebody comes in and ‘bam’ they shoot themselves or they might even shoot the person that comes into the room.”

Mr Maduro felt that many of the television shows today continue to send the wrong message to children.

Supt. Armoury said the RVIPF was trying to appeal to parents especially at this time to desist from possessing illegal firearms in the home and to ensure that their children are not in possession of such weapon. He considered the fact that a parent might be in the home at the time but completely unaware of the child’s access to a firearm. “It is incumbent on the parent to actually police their home,” he noted.

His advice to parents was that they, “physically check to see what the child has in their room, they come home with their bag [and] you need to actually check that bag. Know exactly what they are carrying to school. Are they just carrying books or do they have something else inside there?”