Policeman Kills Pregnant Woman Who Had Earlier Used Badwud

[Mosiah]

Cop In St Thomas Shooting Taken Off Front Line


Published: Monday | September 3, 2012 0 Comments
Following the shooting death of a pregnant woman and the injuring of her sister Saturday afternoon during a confrontation with the police in Yallahs, St Thomas, the policeman involved has been removed from front-line duty and taken into custody as the Independent Commission of Investigations and the police commence separate investigations into the matter.

The police had to move to protect the policeman's family, whose lives were threatened. The Police High Command has deployed members of the Police Chaplaincy Unit, including the force chaplain, to St Thomas to assist and to offer counselling to both families involved.

Further details will be made available as investigation continues.

[Mosiah]

Grief - ‘I did not know the sex of my unborn child’
St Thomas community in mourning after police shooting of pregnant woman

Monday, September 03, 2012

IT was a happy Kayann Lamont, eight months pregnant, who returned home from Manchester last Friday after spending the summer with the father of her unborn child. She was planning to revisit him today.

But the 27-year-old woman, who returned to Logwood in St Thomas to do last-minute back-to-school shopping for her two daughters, never got that chance. Her life came to an abrupt and horrific end on Saturday when she was shot in a controversial incident in Yallahs.

Lamont's sister, Novia, who was also injured in the shooting, was yesterday in a stable condition in hospital, according to family members.

The family said the 27-year-old woman was shot twice, once in the head, while resisting arrest after she was overheard by a policeman using indecent language.

The officer involved in the controversial shooting was yesterday taken into custody, but that was not enough for Lamont's grief-stricken family and members of her community who yesterday expressed outrage at the manner in which the young woman's life came to an end.

"Me feel really bad. Everywhere we go a me and har, we nuh left we one another," said her oldest sister, Shemean Lamont, who stated that she was with her sisters at the time of the shooting, but managed to escape unhurt.
"We want justice. She did not even have a weapon and was hassled and killed like that? We want justice!" she shouted.

According to Shemean's version of the story, the three sisters had just returned from downtown, Kingston when Kayann was overheard using expletives while telling her cousin about how she had been robbed of her money and cellphone while shopping in the city. The policeman, she said, reprimanded her sister, even as he repeated the said word.

Kayann, she said, replied: "Everybody cuss badword, even unuh cuss badword."

But the officer was not pleased with her response and informed her that he was going to arrest her. He then held on to her right hand and allegedly manhandled her, despite being told by onlookers to release her.

Shemean said she and her sister Novia protested, but it was to no use as, in no time, there were explosions and her sister fell to the ground, rolling and bleeding. Novia, she said, was shot in the shoulder.

"Same time mi run behind a fat woman and bend down then get up and run," said Shemean, as she detailed how she managed to escape.

"When mi run off mi hear the third shot ... and that was when the other policemen held onto to the alleged shooter." Four policemen, she said, were on the scene.

Yesterday, Kayann's companion, Leroy Dennis, was himself a picture of grief as he hugged Lamont's five-year-old daughter Sabreka Salmon.

Dennis, who yesterday travelled to St Thomas to comfort the family, said he last spoke with Lamont on her cellphone Saturday, moments after she had been robbed. He said he was looking forward to seeing her today.

"She left me [in Mandeville] Friday evening about 5:30 [to make final preparations] for the children's back-to-school. She said she had to go downtown to buy some things," Dennis said, relating his last face-to-face encounter with his companion.

The distraught Dennis said he never even knew the sex of his unborn child as he wanted it to be a surprise.

The slain woman's friend, Latoya Ricketts, who could barely speak when the Jamaica Observer visited St Thomas yesterday, said Lamont had been staying at her house since her pregnancy and had left on Saturday morning to clean her own house.

"A yesterday morning a wake up and say to my niece 'where is Kay' and she say 'she gone up gone clean cause she say dog a dig out round de house' and me say when dog a dig up house me granny tell me say somebody ago dead," Ricketts said in sorrowful retrospect.

Shortly after that she said she got the terrible news and rushed to the hospital where she saw her friend's lifeless body lying on a hospital bed with blood oozing from her wounds.

One community member who was among a group of visibly upset men said that the police should have handled the matter differently.

"A woman cuss a badword, call too female officers if you can't manage, not because de people dem a laugh deal with it in a better way," he said, interspersing his comments with colourful words.

According to the man, persons were laughing when the officer fell along with Lamont while he was dragging her to the station and the officer allegedly got enraged.

Lamont's grandmother, Esmin Thompson, who raised the sisters, said yesterday that in spite her loss she was happy that the two other sisters had survived the ordeal.

"It could have been my three granddaughters all on one day," she said sorrowfully.

In the meantime, Superintendent Michael Smith of the Yallahs Police Station said statements were collected yesterday morning by officers from his station as well as personnel from the Independent Commission of Investigation.

The policeman in question will remain in custody until a ruling has been made by the director of public prosecution, Smith said.


Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...#ixzz25MFnsK3i

[Mosiah]

The DPP should be able to come back with a ruling by later today.

The reports are - and yes, I did my own investigation - the policeman executed the woman, pumping two shots into her head at close range.

[Exile]

Sounds like it...a head shot??? Madness....

[Mosiah]

Dis wuss dan any act by any common gunman.

And what initiated this encounter with the officer? Badwud!

Time to get that stupid law off the books!

[Hortical]

Dunce cop on a power trip. Cops should show discretion when it comes to enforcing the law.

[Hortical]

The process of hiring cops must be deeply flawed in Jamaica, and you wonder the extent of psychological testing that takes place since these incidents occur too frequently.

[Reggaedoc]

Bwoy, poor black people bear a heavy cross in their own land. No respect or regard for their lives. Sad.

[MdmeX]

This babylon should be sent straight to the gallows. Damn fool. Must be his henchmen who robbed the deceased woman of her cellphone and money.

[Reggaedoc]

Maybe not his henchman, but we need to show some understanding. Here is a woman, most likely of ordinary means who just got robbed in the heat of downtown Kingston, a few days before she has to send her children back to school, and the idiot policemen can't empathize and show some understanding of the ladies frustration and find a better way of calming her down, than to start hauling and pulling her, then eventually shooting the women. Wicked act. Pure dog heart.

[Assasin]

a big section of the force lack any sympathy and empathy for the people of Jamaica. They don't care about the elderly, sick, women, or anybody else. They think every criminal deserve to be shot or sent to jail.

How can this be done to a pregnant woman? Where are compasionate police like recently retired inspector Errol Mason and former Area 2 head Campbell? who worked with communities and work with youths. Sad that you never hear bout these kind of police, and only the "bad" ones we hear about.

[Skeng DX]

[a big section of the force lack any sympathy and empathy for the people of Jamaica]

true.......the police force is just a subset of Jamaica

[Reggaedoc]

You are absolutely right Skeng. There is no compassion or concern for what the common man or woman is going through under tough circumstances. We have become a ME only society where even a member of one's own family, in some circumstances cannot be trusted. Sad indeed.

Rather than showing the woman some understanding about the lost of her property, and calming the woman down in a peaceful manner, he ended executing her. He can't see in this women a person who is somebody's sister, wife, mother, aunt, daughter, girlfriend, granddaughter etc. All that don't matter to him. If she was of a different race or class, then he would probably consider those things.

[Assasin]

You think a the class matter or the amount of money them an get? This is what I have been trying to tell you. There is no reason for locking up people for some of these offenses. Book them and go especially if they are no immediate threat to society.

How can you even think of locking up a pregnant woman? Again I remember seeing a cop carrrying a crown and anchor man in cross road and the cop turned around and the crown and anchor man made a run over towards the post office at about 5 0 clock in the afternoon and the idiot cop shoot at the man, luckily it didn't hurt anybody as people were waiting on bus on the other side.

Police need to do their jobs but they need also to show empathy to the society or how are they going to get assistance and cooperation from them?

[MdmeX]

The policeman, she said, reprimanded her sister, even as he repeated the said word (the same bad wud).