Suspects in custody for St James triple murder
Published:Friday | March 11, 2022 | 12:12 AMHopeton Bucknor
The St James police have taken three men into custody for questioning in connection with the shooting deaths of 19-year-old twin brothers and their 11-year-old sister at their home in Irwin Heights on Wednesday night.
The victims have been identified as 19-year-old Givaughnie Stewart, otherwise called 'Bigga', his brother Givaughn, otherwise called 'Little Man', and Petergaye Cooke.
Reports by the Freeport police are that about 7:15 p.m., the siblings, their mother and their one-year-old cousin were home when the mom left to collect an item from the neighbour's.
Minutes later, men armed with handguns forced their way inside the house and opened fire, hitting the twins and the preteen.
The mother rushed home to discover her three children lying in pools of blood inside a bedroom.
The twins had multiple gunshot wounds while Petergaye sustained one bullet wound to her upper body.
The 46-year-old woman raised an alarm and the police were summoned. On their arrival, the scene was processed and the bodies removed to the morgue for postmortem.
On Thursday, several community members expressed shock at the cold-blooded act.
"Mi can't believe say dem tings yah really happen inna Irwin Heights," one resident who gave his name as Ricky said.
"This is a wicked act. Denise just lose har three children just like that, and fi wha? Over little foolishness," the angry community member stated.
The elderly man believes that the siblings may have been murdered over a recent incident in the community involve other men from the area.
When contacted, a senior police officer confirmed that they had received a report that the brothers had been held at gunpoint in the past. The accused were taken into custody.
"The police carried out an investigation into the report which led to two of the men being arrested, and those men are presently still in police custody," he further stated.
The senior cop related that the police have strong reason to believe that this incident may have contributed to the brothers and their sister being murdered.
"Shortly after the murder of the siblings, we carried out a number of raids at various premises in Irwin Heights and took several men into custody, three of whom we believe can assist us in our investigation," the cop said.
St James recorded four murders on Wednesday, taking the total number of slayings in the parish since the start of the year to 48.
Prior to the triple murder, another victim, 26-year-old Andre Fullerton, of Kirkpatrick Road in the neighbouring community Orange, was shot and killed by attackers traveling in a motor vehicle along the Orange main road on Wednesday morning.
An investigation was also launched into that killing.