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MARIGOT--Commandant of the Gendarmerie in St. Martin and St. Barths Paul Betaille said Tuesday that French St. Martin is blighted by delinquency despite a number of Collectivité training programmes and incentive schemes aimed at the youth. He noted the situation could only improve with dedicated political will and deep analysis of the situation.

Speaking at a gathering and cocktail party in La Savane to mark his departure in August for a new posting, Betaille remarked that "delinquency is ingrained in the local culture," adding young St. Martiners susceptible to delinquency are "a lost generation" and the situation of minors is "worrisome."

His candid remarks told it like it is but were also backed up by a quote from Commandant of the Gendarmerie for the Overseas Territories General Soubelet who on a visit to St. Martin in January of this year said "nothing more can be done by the Gendarmerie to improve the situation. The Gendarmerie does everything it can but it needs the assistance of other services."

"I'm neither an optimist nor a pessimist, but just a realist," Betaille said.

His comments were echoed earlier by his second-in-command Capitaine Sylvain Jouault who at his leaving party more or less described delinquency as a no-win situation.

By all accounts from the round of laudatory speeches, Commandant Betaille completed his three-year posting in St. Martin in exemplary fashion. He leaves in August to take on a new post as Deputy Commandant of Centre National d'Instruction Cynophile de la Gendarmerie in the city of Gramat in the Lot Department, a training school for officers working with police dogs and a posting he had specifically requested.

There was a brief emotional moment when he remembered his wife and five children who left for France a year ago to enrol the children in schools there.

He thanked all the services that he worked with: Police Territorial, the Justice Department and Prosecutor Flavien Noailles, Police aux Frontières (PAF), Dutch-side Police and the Collectivité. He was particularly grateful for the support of Préfet Philippe Chopin, and his two deputies Capitaine Jouault and Capitaine Emmanuel Maignan, who will be second-in-command when the new Commandant arrives.

Outside of work Betaille was a very good runner and participated in most of the running events, sometimes individually or in a Gendarmerie team, as well as those organised by the Gendarmerie's sports club. He still holds the record for the 18K Coast to Coast short distance. Fellow runners Jean-Marc Aubry and Anthony Durand were among a handful of invited athletes at the gathering.

Earlier, Senator Guillaume Arnell jokingly referred to the departure of Préfet Chopin, Capitaine Jouault, Commandant Betaille and Prosecutor Flavien Noailles who departs later this summer as an "epidemic of deserters" before thanking Betaille for his service and presenting him with gifts on behalf of the Collectivité.

Appreciative remarks were also made by Préfète Anne Laubies, MP Daniel Gibbs, Prosecutor Noailles, and Betaille's superior officer Colonel Vagnier, Commandant for Guadeloupe and the Northern Islands.

Noailles said he had enjoyed the working relationship describing Betaille as "a good listener" and "quick to assimilate" in whatever situations arose, adding "you have succeeded in St. Martin and you will succeed in your new job."

Colonel Vagnier praised his "professionalism, loyalty, discretion, and presence on all fronts."

Préfète Laubies handed Betaille the Préfecture medal while colleagues from the Gendarmerie also gave him gifts.

Present at the gathering from the Dutch-side KPSM was Head of Detectives and Forensics Denise Jacobs and Ronald Stassen from the Interpol/Information Unit.