{"id":2879,"date":"2019-09-04T17:51:35","date_gmt":"2019-09-04T17:51:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/westernmirror.com\/?p=2879"},"modified":"2019-09-04T17:51:39","modified_gmt":"2019-09-04T17:51:39","slug":"murderous-st-james","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/?p=2879","title":{"rendered":"Murderous St. James"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><em>Popular businessman among five killed<\/em><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em><strong>Barrington Flemming<\/strong> &#8211; Staff Reporter<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Security Forces have\nsought to tighten the screws in the Western City of Montego Bay with additional\nsecurity personnel, as residents and business interests are yet to come to\ngrips with the murder of popular and well-loved businessman, Andrew \u2018Andy\u2019\nChin, and four other persons, including a woman, in the past four days.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The other victims are 20-year-old Vardian Banton, otherwise called \u2018Jason\u2019 of Robert Reid Drive, Glendevon; twenty-nine-year-old Conrad Lawrence, otherwise called \u2018Forty\u2019of Belfont, Catadupa; 37-year-old Suzette Reid, vendor of Lindo\u2019s Hill, Whithorn, Westmoreland and an unidentified man, also of Belfont.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"344\" src=\"http:\/\/westernmirror.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/GUT-BOTTOM.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2881\" srcset=\"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/GUT-BOTTOM.jpg 500w, https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/GUT-BOTTOM-300x206.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><figcaption><em>This photo captures the early morning scene of a section of Gut Bottom in Granville, which was cordoned off as two policemen stand guard in front of the location where Banton was gunned down in the wee hours of Monday morning when the sound of high-powered weaponry was heard.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The top brass of the security forces has pledged to ramp up\ntheir efforts to make downtown Montego Bay safer as questions are swirling\nregarding the effectiveness of the State of Emergency, which was re-imposed in\nApril. It does not, however, seem to be having its intended impact, as violence\nproducers have continued their onslaught, pushing murder figures to 92 since\nthe start of the year from 67 the same time last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The police in the meantime, reported that in the early hours of Saturday morning about 4 o\u2019clock, Chin, who operated a cash Pot shop at Sunshine Plaza along Church Street in Montego Bay, was held at gunpoint by three men who took him to his house at Mango Walk and carried out a search there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It is further reported that the men later took him to his\nbusiness place along Church Street where his firearm, vehicle and a safe with\ncash were stolen. The men then opened fire at him, hitting him several times. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The police were summoned and later transported Chin to the\nhospital from where the body was sent to the morgue.&nbsp; <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;Chin\u2019s murder\ncontinues to reverberate among the business community and citizens who continue\nto hail him as a kind and helpful citizen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The police, who have cited that the investigations are at a\npreliminary stage, are hoping to make an early breakthrough in the case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>BLOODLETTING CONTINUES<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The bloodletting, however, started on Friday when about\n10p.m., Lawrence was at his gate at Belfont, when he was pounced upon by a\ngroup of men armed with guns who opened fire at him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Residents alerted the police who came to the community but\ndid not find Lawrence.&nbsp; It was hours\nlater that his lifeless body was discovered by residents. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">While the police received a respite on Sunday, they were\nagain called to the scene of another homicide on Monday as about 12:30 a.m.,\nresidents of Gut Bottom in Granville heard explosions believed to be gunshots\nand summoned the police. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The lawmen who came did not find anything unusual and left. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It was not until about 6:30 a.m. that residents stumbled\nupon Banton\u2019s lifeless body and again called the police who came, processed the\nscene and had the body removed to the morgue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The community of Belfont was the scene of another murder on\nMonday where the police reported that an unidentified man was shot and killed\nabout 10 a.m. by unknown assailants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Meanwhile, detectives assigned to the Montego Bay Police\nStation are awaiting the post mortem results to determine the cause of death of\n37-year-old Suzette Reid, vendor of Lindo\u2019s Hill, Withorn, Westmoreland, whose\nbody was found in the upscale community of Westgate in the parish on Monday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;It is reported that\nabout 3:00 p.m., residents stumbled upon the body of Reid and summoned the\npolice. On the arrival of the lawmen Reid was seen lying face down in bushes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The other victims are 20-year-old Vardian Banton, otherwise called \u2018Jason\u2019 of Robert Reid Drive, Glendevon; twenty-nine-year-old Conrad Lawrence, otherwise called \u2018Forty\u2019of Belfont, Catadupa; 37-year-old Suzette Reid, vendor of Lindo\u2019s Hill, Whithorn, Westmoreland and an unidentified man, also of Belfont.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2880,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1498,1500,18,272,19,1499,31,390,30],"class_list":["post-2879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-andy-chin","tag-belfont","tag-crime","tag-granville","tag-montego-bay","tag-murderous","tag-st-james","tag-state-of-public-emergency","tag-western-jamaica"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2879","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\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2879"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2879\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2882,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2879\/revisions\/2882"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}