THE men who recently died in police custody were “collateral damage” in the fight against crime, according to Oswald Brown, the government’s press attaché and cultural affairs officer in Washington, DC.

In a Facebook post denouncing the “bombardment of criticism” that has been levelled at the Commissioner of Police, Mr Brown described the victims as “known criminals,” but called their deaths in police custody unfortunate.

In a related message, he said: “This is a war against criminals and the police must win it by any means necessary or the Bahamas will plunge into a state of anarchy.”

This is the second time Mr Brown’s controversial views have been aired on the social networking site since his appointment to the government post.

Last week, he defended himself against accusations that he promoted victimisation after comments he made in a Facebook post were published in the press.

Mr Brown claimed he accidentally posted a message on the Facebook wall of Andrew Burrows, the ZNS Executive News Director, rather than send it as a private message.

In a follow-up Facebook post, he wrote: “I’m sharing this so that all of you who I’ve noticed this morning again castigating me based on Adrian Ramsey’s version of what appeared in The Nassau Guardian can see what was actually published by that newspaper. As far as I’m concerned, I did nothing wrong, other than inadvertently post my message to Andrew Burrows on his wall rather than in his in-box as I intended to do.

“In her usual obnoxious manner, Dominique Demeritte, which more likely than not is a fake name being used by someone to sometimes make slanderous remarks on Facebook, decided to re-post my private message to Mr Burrows.”

In the original post, Mr Brown urged Mr Burrows to fire Free National Movement (FNM) operatives at the Broadcasting Corporation for “undermining all the good things this PLP government is doing.”

“I’m sending you this in-box because I am mad as hell about what appears to be a well-organised attempt by FNM operatives at ZNS to undermine the leadership of Rev. William Thompson and indeed the entire current management at ZNS,” Mr Brown posted.

“If you follow Facebook, which I know you do, you would have noticed that Dominique Demeritte, whomever that is, has been unrelenting in her criticism of ZNS and she has been using some information in her posts that could only have been given to her (or him) by someone at ZNS.

“I think you need to find out who that person is and arrange for them to find a different line of work.

“We have got to stop being timid of firing people who are seeking to undermine all the good things this PLP government is doing.”

Mr Burrows responded that he is aware of what is going on, adding that the “source” at ZNS has “wrapped herself up in a tight little squeeze.”

But the message from Brown was not sent to Burrows’ private in-box as Brown had intended. The message was reposted on several Facebook pages and received hundreds of comments Tuesday.

Many Facebook users expressed outrage, calling Mr Brown’s request a blatant call for victimisation.

However, Mr Brown said, “My solution to this situation is exactly what I suggested: if the culprit or culprits are exposed, fire them.

“I make no apologies in suggesting this.”