Mother pleads with Calabar student's killer; cops struggle to find leads
Published:Tuesday | January 3, 2017 | 12:00 AMJason Cross
The police have said that they have no leads yet in Sunday's early morning killing of Calabar High School cricketer Stephan McLaren. But his mother, Evelyn Burton, is adamant that the killers, who she labels as heartless, must turn themselves into the police.
Deal with the police or deal with God. Her promise is that God will answer her prayers and that they won't fall on deaf ears. She insists that whatever she requests from God, He delivers.
Barton wanted her son's 'heartless' killers to know: "Anything mi pray to God for, Him give it to me. You don't believe me? I am a praying person and God loves me. When me a pray, me pray fi everybody, trust me. All the killer weh kill me son, I pray fi him, too."
She went on to encourage the killer to do the right thing and turn himself in. Another promise Barton made was that the killer would not live in peace if he didn't make himself available to the police.
"Mek him bring in himself," she said as if she were speaking directly to God.
"Listen to me. If you hide in the hills, if you hide under the water, if you hide in the sky, God going to find you anywhere yuh deh. Bring in yourself, Killer. Tell your family, your cousin, your mother, and your father to bring you in. Trust mi, yuh not going inna nuh peace because mi a go dung pon mi knees, and anything mi pray, work!" stressed Barton.
"Let mi see the killer before mi dead," she said
The Gleaner spoke yesterday to Superintendent Stephanie Lindsay, who is in charge of the Corporate Communications Unit of the police force, whose request was for anybody, including the friends McLaren was travelling with, who may have witnessed the incident, to come forward with the information.
"We are urging persons who were present and may have witnessed the incident not to remain silent. Find a way to report it to the police. You can call 119 and just tell us what you know. You could even use crime stop - 311 - and provide the information. We just want somebody who was present and would be able to identify the individual," encouraged Lindsay.
She continued: "Now is not the time to see things and think that you need to be fearful and not come forward with the information. The investigation is still active. We just need to get some information as to who. We have been doing a lot of canvassing out there trying to get some information, but the information is not forthcoming."