Winston Courtney: The Man Who Chose Goodness,
Forgiveness, and Reconciliation Over Revenge.

1. Winston Courtney was a member of the Royal Grenada Police Force. By 1978 he had risen to the rank of Inspector and to the position of Head of Special Branch.



2. He was however removed as Head of Special Branch mainly because Prime Minister Gairy was unhappy with reports that he was producing as Head of Special Branch.



3. Some of Courtney's reports which were obtained after the revolution revealed that Courtney had his pulse on the political situation in Grenada. They also revealed that he was a very independent thinker.



4. For example Courtney warned Gairy in some of his reports that there was a very serious danger that his government could be toppled by the NJM. He revealed a very high respect for the abilities and capacity of the NJM leaders. And he advised that efforts should be made by the government to establish a line of communication with the NJM with a view to allaying their fears and reducing the dangerous tension which was building up in Grenada.



5. Of course Courtney’s advice was not taken. Instead he was removed as head of special branch.



6. In November 1979, six months into the revolution, Courtney was arrested and locked up without charge or trial.



7. In November 1980 after being in detention for approximately one year the devastating news reached him that his first son, Andy, had been killed along with 3 others. They were returning from a night out when the vehicle they were in was stopped and all the persons in the car were shot and killed instantly. The action was carried out by a group who were opposed to the revolution and were offering armed resistance. It was viewed by those in authority and by supporters of the revolution as a terrorist act. However within circles opposed to the revolution there were rampant rumours that the killings were carried out by the PRA . Such rumours must have naturally impacted on Courtney’s mind.



8. In response to the killing of his son Courtney was released from prison. He buried his son and immediately departed Grenada.



9. The twin blows of his imprisonment followed by the death of his son impacted heavily on his family and as so often happens in cases as these, resulted in the break up of his first marriage.



10. In exile from his homeland Courtney experienced great difficulties, financial and otherwise. However, gradually he got things together. He took advantage of the opportunity to advance his formal education and he completed a High School Diploma which complemented his natural intelligence and life experience.



11. In 1990 Courtney returned to Grenada to take up an appointment at the prison. At the time the Grenada prison was regularly in the news for all the wrong reasons. There were lots of complaints about the harsh regime being run by the then commissioner, a Bajan.



12. However Courtney’s appointment caused concern among the political prisoners and panic among their relatives. Those relatives were frightened that Courtney would embark on a mission of revenge.



13. Instead of a mission of revenge, Courtney set out to do the exact opposite. He embarked on a mission of reconciliation and goodness. In his capacity as superintendent he immediately attempted to ease the harshness and reduce the tension at the prison. This brought him into regular confrontation with the autocratic commissioner. But Courtney held his ground.



14. In 1991 Courtney assumed the leadership of the prison following the death of the Bajan commissioner. He was on spot in July 1991 when preparations were being made to hang five of the political prisoners. He displayed great humanity during that difficult period for the prisons. He went out of his way to ensure that the condemned men had all their rights to communicate with and be visited by their families.



15. After the commutation of the death sentences of the seventeen political prisoners Courtney embarked on a program that would transform the prison. He recognized that in the political prisoners he had a resource that could be used to uplift the educational standard of less fortunate prisoners. The results of the prison education program has been a shining light.



16. But perhaps Courtney’s greatest legacy, the genius of the man, was his recognition that in the final analysis security is not a function of the amount of guns, manpower and other resources at one’s command: security is measured by the absence of tension. And the absence of or reduction in tension is achieved by respecting people, respecting their rights and respecting them as human beings. Force being only morally justified when despite the respect someone, or a few, are unreasonable and bent on violating the rights of others and making trouble. And even then such force must be dispensed in accordance with established procedure.



17. In his efforts to change the practices associated with prisons Courtney encountered a lot of resistance. That was not surprising. For his way was revolutionary. Prison in the Caribbean has always been viewed as a place of punishment. Now this man was preaching that prisoners had rights and that the role of the prison was to rehabilitate people.



18. The resistance Courtney met explains why he was ousted from the Grenada prison in 1996. He had won the love and admiration of the prisoners. Many lives were touched and changed as a result of his work. He won the admiration of the international community engaged in penal reform work. He was a member of a UN delegation to Haiti in 1995 to investigate prison conditions there. But he lost the confidence of much of his staff who, schooled in the old way just could not comprehend what that man was doing to their prison.



19. It is a testimony to the work Courtney did that Grenada’s is the only prison in the Caribbean in which there has not been violent upheavals in the last seven years.



20. Upon his departure from the Grenada prison Courtney was invited by the government of St. Lucia to take up the post of Commissioner of Prisons in that country. Before his arrival in St. Lucia, for a period of several months the prison there was in the news for all the wrong reasons. There had been riot. A section of the prison had been burnt down. There were regular escapes. A police presence was called in to provide round the clock armed guard. On the day Courtney arrived there was a riot. It was the last riot.



21. The first thing Courtney did was to restore all the rights of the inmates. He addressed as much of the grievances as he could. And he insisted that the regulations be followed.



22. The second thing Courtney did, once he was convinced that he had won the respect of the inmates by demonstrating to them that he was fair and he respected them, was to have the armed guards removed.



23. The third thing that Courtney did was to approach the government of St. Lucia for the authority to modernize the facilities at the prison and in particular to allow inmates access to modern amenities e.g. radios, TV’s, etc.



24. Unfortunately due to an eye problem brought on by diabetes Courtney had to leave his position in St. Lucia. He was thus unable to complete his mission. But the government of St. Lucia has nothing but high praise for what Courtney was able to achieve during his short stay there.



25. Today Courtney is at home. Most of the time he cannot see. But he is being well cared for by his wife and maintains an optimistic outlook on life.