Barrington Flemming – Staff Reporter
“When mi see him, him run outta the house, hold up him belly and bawl out ‘Mama!’ Mi look and see the blood a spew out mi scream out ‘woieeeeee’, and feel like mi did a have diarrhoea. Mi bawl out again and again and then rush wid him go a hospital, but him nuh live.”
The pain tinged words of the anguished 84-year-old widow, Hilda Stoddart of Johnson Hill, Glendevon, Montego Bay, who is still nervous and bewildered, as the gravity of the barbaric act weighs heavily on her mind. Her 43-year-old son, Fabian Stoddart, otherwise called ‘Steve’, stabbed his 52-year-old brother, Robert Stoddart, otherwise called ‘Coco’, a casual worker, to death on Friday, December 20.
Hilda, her heart in tatters, is still struggling to come to grips with the fact that one son is dead and the other in jail, relegating her to a sorrowful Christmas season.
She related to the Western Mirror that she still feels nervous and numb as she recalls what transpired on the fateful day.
“Gary and Steve live at the same house next door to mine, but Gary love to keep him place clean and him girlfriend always come over.”
She said Robert was chiding Fabian for keeping the house untidy and a quarrel ensued between them.
Fabian is purported to have gone to his brother’s room and began hurling expletives at him, calling his older brother a ‘b-man’ in the process, and Gary pushed him from the room and told him to get out.
Fabian reportedly returned with a knife which he allegedly plunged into his brother’s abdomen and pulled it out.
Robert ran from the room and bawled out “Mama!”, and that’s when Hilda’s worst fears were realized, when she saw her son crying and bloodied, rushing to her.
SURRENDERED TO THE POLICE
Fabian subsequently went to the Freeport Police Station where he surrendered to the police and confessed to the killing of his brother, and was taken into custody.
“Mi used to talk to that bwoy all the time because every day him threaten him bredda dem and mi used to tell them to report it.”
Hilda said while her sons all help to take care of her, there is a special bond between her and Robert.
She shared that she had a difficult marriage, and her husband died 26 years ago. Two of her sons also predeceased Robert, one died in England and another in the USA.
“Gary was so close to me. He would come home and the first thing him do would be to come and look for me and ask if I am alright and if mi hungry. Him would say ‘Mama Hilda, yu aright mi modda? Yu hungry?’ Him always checking up on mi to ensure that mi alright. But now him gone, Steve butcher him.”
She said another of her sons, Ruenth Stoddart, who was named after his father, is now living with her and has taken up where Robert has left off.
“You know, I have not gone to the police station to see Fabian. I just don’t have the feeling to go see him. I can’t bring myself to go look for him.”
“People claim that he has mental problems. I don’t believe that because somebody who is mental can’t drive taxi fi people, bring their correct money to them and when he gets his money, knows what to make on himself with it. If he gets sick and get tablets, he spits them out.”
“Right now, is the grace of God keeping me. My Church has been good to – me Bethel Assembly. The pastor and members have been so helpful; they are a tower of strength. As I say, is only God keeping me, only him because without him, I can’t manage this,” bemoans Mrs. Stoddart.