{"id":1519,"date":"2018-06-13T18:50:22","date_gmt":"2018-06-13T18:50:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/westernmirror.com\/?p=1519"},"modified":"2018-06-13T18:50:22","modified_gmt":"2018-06-13T18:50:22","slug":"security-guard-killed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/?p=1519","title":{"rendered":"Security guard killed"},"content":{"rendered":"

Security guard, 35-year-old Anthony Phillips, an ex-soldier, was on duty safeguarding Sam Sharpe Teachers\u2019 College in Granville, St James, but there was no one to protect him when he was pounced upon and murdered in the early hours of Sunday morning.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Another security guard who was also on duty with him managed to escape unhurt.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s disbelief over Phillips\u2019 untimely death. A third-year student who preferred not to be identified, admitted that on hearing the news, \u201cIt really shook me up,\u201d so much so that she left her home to go and check for herself if what she heard was the truth and not someone joking.<\/p>\n

The student lamented that, \u201cit\u2019s a community where when things happen, everybody goes on as if nothing happened. Some people don\u2019t know even if it happen in the middle of the road!\u201d<\/p>\n

Phillips\u2019 co-worker and friend for many years, Courtney Whyte, is left puzzled. \u201cI don\u2019t know of anybody and him who is involved in anything.\u201d\u00a0 He said Phillips \u201cis not a man of many words\u201d and was \u201cquick to walk away from anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re coming from way back; we were both in the army together and he\u2019s a very good person; calm spirit, nutt\u2019n trouble him, so surprising!\u201d said Whyte.<\/p>\n

Phillips, an employee of King Alarm security firm, was doing the graveyard duty at the main gate to Sam Sharpe Teachers\u2019 College when he was killed.<\/p>\n

While there\u2019s no clear indication of motive, Chairman of the college\u2019s board of governors, Norman Reid, is confident that the heinous crime was not an attack on the school.<\/p>\n

The student population has been off campus for the past three weeks with the end of the second semester.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is very unfortunate because generally, there is a lot of peace and calm in the area,\u201d said Mr. Reid, who extended condolence to the security guard\u2019s family.<\/p>\n

He said a committee of the board would be meeting with King Alarm to reassess the security arrangement for the college. Also, he would be speaking with the Region Four office of the Ministry of Education on the matter of counselling for staff members still at work at the college.<\/p>\n

\"\"
The guard room in which security guard Anthony Phillips was killed in the wee hours of Sunday morning. It is located at the main entrance to Same Sharpe Teachers’ College in Granville. – CWP photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The official police report states that about 3:15 a.m., Phillips and his co-worker were on duty at the main gate to the college when his colleague heard strange sounds coming from the Guard House. He looked and saw a lone gunman pointing a gun inside the Guard House through the door and saying, \u201cDon\u2019t move bwoy\u201d.<\/p>\n

The co-worker, who had a knife, reportedly tried to assist Phillips and a struggle ensued between the three. The gunman, however, managed to overpower the two security guards. Phillips\u2019 co-worker ran and shortly after, explosions were heard.<\/p>\n

The police were alerted and on arrival, Phillips was seen at the entrance to the guard house, lying face down in a pool of blood with gunshot wounds to the face.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Security guard, 35-year-old Anthony Phillips, an ex-soldier, was on duty safeguarding Sam Sharpe Teachers\u2019 College in Granville, St James, but there was no one to protect him when he was pounced upon and murdered in the early hours of Sunday morning. Another security guard who was also on duty with him managed to escape unhurt. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1520,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[272,713,714,154,31,264],"class_list":["post-1519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-granville","tag-sam-sharpe-teachers-college","tag-security-guard","tag-shooting","tag-st-james","tag-western-mirror"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1519"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1519\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1524,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1519\/revisions\/1524"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}