BLOODY FINALE
End-of-year double murder rocks St James
Published:Saturday | January 1, 2022 | 12:08 AMHopeton Bucknor/Gleaner Writer
The parish of St James closed out the year with bloodshed yesterday with the brazen daylight gun murder of a municipal warder and his uncle, who were shot, in a drive-by attack.
The victims have been identified as 46-year-old Peter Stewart and his nephew, 33-year-old Jermaine Evans, who was employed to the St James Municipal Corporation. Both lived in John’s Hall in the parish.
Reports are that about 8 a.m., Evans was driving a Toyota motor car from the direction of John’s Hall towards Montego Bay, with Stewart in the front passenger seat.
On reaching a section of the roadway bordering Tucker and Retirement, known as Friendship, they were approached by a group of men in another motor car, who blocked their path and sprayed their vehicle with bullets, hitting both occupants multiple times.
The gunmen sped from the scene in the direction of Retirement, while Evans lost control of the vehicle, which crashed into an embankment.
The injured men were assisted by passing motorists to the Cornwall Regional Hospital, where they were pronounced dead.
When The Gleaner visited the location, several residents said that both men were good members of their community, decrying the manner in which they lost their lives.
One man said that he was chopping wood in bushes nearby when the sound of gunfire forced him to take cover.
“To tell you the truth, me don’t really see what took place, but is one thing I know is that a pure gunshot mi hear. Next thing is a car me see a speed away and mi hear the crash.
“All this time, mi still bend down in a the bush because mi still don’t know what a gwaan. Is when mi hear ‘nuff’ car start stop and mi hear people a cry out, a that time mi come out of the bush and walk down the road,” he said, noting his shock when he saw the men suffering from gunshot wounds.
POSSIBLE GANG WAR LINK
He said that he knew Stewart to be a good citizen.
“We have not yet gotten any form of leads, but we do have reason to believe that this double murder may have stemmed from an ongoing dispute between rival gangs from the John’s Hall and Retirement communities,” one senior officer told The Gleaner, adding that the police will be using the support of the army to ensure that calm is maintained in the communities over the next couple of days to prevent any reprisals.
Up to last Saturday, St James had recorded 157 homicides, a 29.8 per cent increase over that recorded for the corresponding period between January 1 and December 25, 2020.