mike_s:
You know... the Police on Bonaire have known this problem has been going on for years. They know who's doing it. It's obvisous they are making no effort to stop the crime on tourist on the island.
I want to go to Bonaire someday, but stories of theft on this island sound frustrating enough to make you not want to go.
I've not heard of diver theft problems on any island as bad as Bonaire. Just shows they don't care to do anything to fix the problem.
Mike,
Apparently you have never been to Bonaire and are making assumptions about the crime situations on Bonaire. I'm not saying that they don't exist, they do, as on other islands, and as someone who lives and owns a hospitality related business on Bonaire and came to Bonaire for 15 years prior to living, I have kept a constant watch on the crime situation. Luckily, we have never had a theft problem now or in the past.
First, Bonaire over the last year has taken a more agressive approach towards "petty theft", which you do not hear about on "boards". Secondly, we are a very small island and have a total census of around 13,000 people. The government and police of Bonaire cannot publish their every lead and finding regarding these petty theft crimes as they do on the states (such as evening news, etc) as it would be detrimental to their investigations given the small size of the island. Also what you all don't see or hear about is when a "theft ring" is uncovered, it is posted in the local newspapers. Unless you have access to "Extra" or one of the other papiamentu or Dutch Language newspapers, you will not hear about the successes the police department has had.
Another thing to remember is that people tend to post or report problems rather than post if nothing happened and they had nothing to report. My best guestimate on an average is that approximately 1% or less of the tourism population is affected by "petty crimes" on Bonaire. I am sure that is less than you would see on other Caribbean islands. It would truly be unrealistic to assume that ANY place in the world would be crime free, especially with human nature the way it is.
I think I will conduct a study of trip reports from various websites with boards that support this feature, maybe we will have a better idea, especially as to perception vs reality, especially compared to the other islands.
I will work on it and post a report, just to see. Like I said, it's not that we don't have crime on Bonaire we do, I just think it is blown way out of proportion compared to other islands.
