A schoolboy, 18 year old Omar Kelly, was jailed for five years for illegal possession of a firearm when he appeared in the Gun Court yesterday. Kelly had pleaded guilty to the charge.
The facts of the case were that on June 27, 2008, Kelly (who was 17 at the time), was at Half-Way Tree Square, St. Andrew, and began behaving boisterously. The police reportedly reprimanded him, and in the process searched him and found that he was in possession of a mobile phone which displayed the picture of a gun. The police questioned him about the gun, and he reportedly told them where it could be found. They accompanied him to his home in Fletcher’s Land, Kingston, where he showed them a home-made gun underneath his bed. He was then arrested and charged.
The judge, in sentencing Kelly, said he had to send a strong message because firearm offences were too prevalent in Jamaica.
40 year old Rodney Joseph, a man who was accused of regularly sexually assaulting and beating his 80 year old mother, was reportedly shot and killed by the police at his home at Top Hill, St. Elizabeth yesterday.
According to reports, early yesterday morning, a police team went to Joseph’s house, and tried to convince him to exit the house peacefully. It’s alleged that Joseph subsequently rushed from inside the house with a knife in his hand and stabbed at a policeman. Another policeman reportedly fired three shots at the knife-wielding man, hitting him in the side and shoulder. Joseph was rushed to the Black River Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
The daggering dance style that’s popular in the dancehall, was reportedly the source of a feud which led to an 18 year old man’s death in Portland on Sunday (August 22). According to reports, Daniel Blair of Windsor in Portland, was at a dance at Rivers View, Rio Grande Valley in the parish in the early hours of Sunday morning, when a dispute developed between himself and another man. It is reported that the dispute had been ongoing, but took a turn for the worse on Sunday because one of the men was seen ‘daggering’ a female said to be a close friend of the other.
A knife was reportedly brought into play, and Blair was stabbed in the right side of his chest. He was later pronounced dead at the Port Antonio hospital. His 20-year-old assailant, who was taken into custody, is expected to be charged soon.
The police have indicated that a gang feud between men from sections of Olympic Gardens known as ‘Back Road’ and Tower Avenue was the reason behind yesterday’s murder of eight year old Jodian Bignal at Mahagony Road in Olympic Gardens. Reports indicate that Bignal, a student of the Seaward Primary and Junior High School, was at home at approximately 2:40 a.m., when four gunmen broke open a window to the house and opened fire hitting her. She was taken to hospital, but died while undergoing treatment.
Police personnel and mourners who were in attendance at yesterday’s funeral for alleged gangster, Andre Smellie, were reportedly forced to take cover, as the man’s cronies reportedly fired numerous shots into the air in close proximity to the where the service was being held on Tavern Drive in Papine, St. Andrew.
Smellie, who was allegedly a key member of the Dog Paw gang, was shot and killed last month by the police during an alleged shoot out. Police personnel who were on hand at yesterday’s funeral, called immediately for reinforcements, but by the time they arrived, the shooting had ended, and no one of interest was held.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers working at the DHL express consignment operation in Cincinnati, seized more than 52 pounds (22 kilograms) of marijuana last week. The drug was hidden inside a tombstone which was being shipped from Kingston, Jamaica to London, England.
According to reports, officers conducting enforcement operations became suspicious of the item, and a narcotics detection dog alerted aggressively to the parcel. An x-ray examination of the item revealed anomalies, and several packages of marijuana were subsequently found concealed within a metal box which was wrapped in metal mesh and hidden inside the concrete tombstone. The street value of the marijuana is approximately US$52,000.
The tombstone (picture below), bears the name of 35-year-old Delroy Senior. Part of its inscription reads, “your place no one can fill.”
The police are warning motorists to be on the look out for persons who continue the practice of hitting the vehicles of other motorists, then robbing them of their possessions (and/or vehicle) when they stop to assess the damage.
In one recent incident, a taxi traveling from Spanish Town to Linstead was hit from behind at around 10 in the night. When the driver stopped and alighted from the vehicle, two men who were traveling in the car that hit them pulled guns and robbed the occupants of the taxi of cash, jewellery and cellphones.
The police are warning all motorists to be careful where they stop if they’re involved in an accident. Motorists are advised to drive to a safe location (e.g. a police station) to handle the matter. They’ve noted that incidents involving these deliberate “accidents” are frequent, and therefore persons should not stop if they are hit while driving in secluded areas. Motorists are advised to be observant and use their mirrors frequently to be aware of who is behind them and for how long. The crash robber practice has also become popular at traffic lights.
Cedric ‘Doggie’ Murray, who had been on Jamaica’s top 10 most wanted fugitives list for more than seven years, was shot dead at approximately 7:30 a.m. near the border of Clarendon and Manchester during an alleged gun battle with the police. A Cigpro 9mm pistol was reportedly taken from Murray’s body, along with a diary which detailed much of his criminal activities.
Here are some extracts from Murray’s gangster diary:
“May 24, Babylon — the enemy — invaded Tivoli Gardens, gunshots rang out for hours from every corner of West Kingston and other places of Kingston to protect the man, the don of all dons, Christopher Coke aka ‘Dudus’.”
“My don is free; I will always say Jim Brown. I am loyal to the Coke family and my guns will always be ready. I may never see my don again — maybe years to come — but he knows that I will always be there for him.”
“Babylon feel seh man a fool like dem. Dem feel seh dem can just come an’ kill mi. Dem better know seh mi a gangster fi life, all out when we get drawn out, straight bullet fi dem. My gun is my best friend, we are always together, always.”
“I fired my AK until my finger was numb. I eat gunpowder until my throat was sore.”
