Tears for slain girl
St James in shock over killing of bright 9-year-old Glendevon Primary athlete
NORWOOD, St James — Tears flowed uncontrollably in the Beverly Hills section of the inner-city community of Hendon here, where family and community members mourned Friday’s killing of a promising nine-year-old student.
Young Kela was shot under bizarre circumstances at her home, allegedly by a 14-year-old boy from this tough western Jamaica neighbourhood.
The 14-year-old fled the scene following the shooting but was subsequently turned over to the police by family members late Friday night.
The police said that shortly after 3:00 pm, on Friday, Kela and two other children, aged six and three, were in a downstairs room along with the 14-year-old when a gunshot was heard.
Unaware of what was happening adults rushed downstairs where they said they saw the teen running away with a gun in his hand.
They then discovered the blood-drenched body of the Glendevon Primary and Junior High School student with what happened to be a gunshot wound to the chest.
She was rushed to the Cornwall Regional Hospital where she died while undergoing treatment.
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Kela’s grief-stricken father, Michael Bailey, related that the teen, who was a family friend, menacingly pointed the gun at his daughter before allegedly shooting her.
“Him (teen) asked the six-year-old say if him shoot the nine-year-old (Kela) if he would tell his mother. So him (six-year-old) say, ‘yes’ and him (teen) still squeeze the trigger and kill mi daughter. God Almighty, man! Nothing cyaan go so!” bemoaned the distraught father, who wept uncontrollably while he spoke with the Jamaica Observer.
“Him come there with him gun. The adults don’t know wha a go on, you know. So when they hear the explosion and run out, a him dem see a run out the yard wid him gun.”
He reflected that, initially, when he got the disturbing news at work, he did not believe.
“When I got a call say mi daughter get shot, when me ask who shot mi daughter, dem say a little boy name ‘Buss Head’. Mi think is a catapult or a elastic, so mi rush go up a hospital an’ mi hear say she inside the [operating] theatre. Mi sit outside a wait when doctor call mi and say she was serious and she couldn’t make it. She got shot in her chest and it go through her back because it was close range,” the distressed father recanted.
He revealed that he had a close bond with Kela, who was the only daughter of his eight children.
“Oh God, Kela is nine year old and she come and clip mi finger nail dem, toenail dem, and mi put her to her bed. Me have eight of dem, and she is the only girl, so she just stick to me…she don’t leave me. Everywhere mi go a she. She cling to mi. One daughter… Mie no see nobody so. And she good pon her book. A pure high mark mi little daughter get. And the little boy come kill mi little daughter,” he rued.
Kela’s mother, Sheena Grant, who had to be taken to hospital to seek medical attention, was too overwhelmed with grief to speak to reporters. She had to be consoled by family members and friends.
Kela’s siblings openly cried and stared blankly when the news team visited the area yesterday.
“Kela is mi only sister. She bright a school, do her work, jovial, loving, kind,” was how her brother, Roxroy described her.
Another brother, Javin, concurred.
“Kela was a loving person, mi love her to mi heart. She always around her brothers. She is a tomboy,” expressed the brother who said that he was sleeping upstairs when the incident occurred.
“She was an athlete at the Glendevon Primary and Junior High School. Everybody a bawl … all stranger, everybody a bawl.”
One woman at the scene was overheard expressing how the atmosphere was even more emotionally charged Friday night than yesterday.
“If it was tears to bring back Kela, when you see the amount of people out here a mourn last (Friday) night, she would come back alive. She added that the young student was very well mannered.
St James, the parish in which most murders have occurred in recent years, has been grappling with a zippy killing rate since the start of the year, with homicides reaching the 100 mark in mid-May and are now pushing towards 130, based on a tally done by the Sunday Observer.
There were 268 murders officially reported by police statistics in the parish last year, although there are views in some sections of the parish that the number was higher than that.
The killings have not abated, despite the Jamaica Constabulary Force’s decision to deploy more police personnel to the parish, and in some cases transfer some of those who had been serving there to other areas. The Ministry of National Security has also announced plans to cool trigger-happy criminals, but those too have flopped.
“St James needs to be purged,” one businessman who declined to be named told the Sunday Observer yesterday. It’s not only the criminals who need to be apprehended, but many of the police personnel who serve in the parish are corrupt and so they don’t pay enough attention to some of the things that are going on.
“The Government, too, needs to realise that hunting gunmen and shooting them if you catch them will not work, because more and more will surface after a while. It really needs an economic solution, whereby more employment opportunities are opened up to the citizens. In the latest incident, it seems that what happened, too was, a breakdown in the values at home. Young people have too easy access to getting firearms in their hands. God, help us!” the businessman said.
This is so sad, that boy should spend his whole life in Jail I hope they charge him enuh and don’t worry bout him age he’s a heartless wicked human being
Rest in peace Kela.This is just way too much.
That 14yo killer if is really him kill kela ,shoud be shot between the eyes 4 times on sight. ..that’s justice but it still wouldn’t be enough! Police should check for signs of molestation on Kela,could be a propable motive for him killing her!