CRUSHED - Vendor killed in bus crash dreamt of building her own home one day

As 44-year-old vendor Eletia Brown hurriedly pushed her cart filled with sweets and other goods on to the B&D Trawling compound on Port Royal Street in Kingston for storage yesterday afternoon, she had one aim: beating the 6 p.m. curfew.

But she never made it home.

Brown was struck and crushed by a Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC) bus shortly before 5 p.m. The bus reportedly switched lanes before hitting Brown, who sells in the vicinity of the Digicel headquarters. Her body was reportedly dragged for metres before the unit stopped.

The mother of four, who had been bouncing about as investors bought up property in downtown Kingston, had long dreamt of building a home for her and her children, said son, 25-year-old Carl Robinson.

“That was main goal number one. She has been moving around because of the whole downtown Kingston redevelopment,” Robinson said yesterday.

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“She was actually working towards buying a piece of land or a little house. She say she was tired of moving up and down and to live amongst certain people. She did want fi live comfortable.”

Distraught family members fought emotions as they confirmed the woman’s death.

“She basically reach her destination and about fi turn in,” Keneisha Saunders, a cousin, told The Gleaner yesterday evening.

“The last conversation I had with her was last night. She seh she a try come een after 4 p.m.”

Brown had resided at 60 Hanover Street in Kingston.

As some persons, including children, scampered to pick up items from the rubble that was left behind, bystanders who claimed they knew her well said she had always requested another person to push the cart on to the compound in the evenings.

But on Wednesday, she had a last appointment – with death.

The Corporate Communications Unit of the Jamaica Constabulary Force confirmed the incident to The Gleaner last night but said very few details were available at the time. The police could not give any info on the condition of the bus driver.

Several calls to Cecil Thoms, communication manager at the JUTC, went unanswered.

The state-owned bus company recorded a 19 per cent decline in traffic crashes for financial year 2019-2020, The Gleaner has learnt.

The JUTC has also paid out in excess of $200 million in judgments and settlements for the period.

In an email response earlier on Wednesday to a week-long request for information, Managing Director Paul Abrahams disclosed that its buses had been involved in 845 crashes over the period.

For the previous year, there were 1,041 crashes.

Since 2018, buses have been involved in at least eight fatal crashes, resulting in the deaths of four motorists, three pedestrians, and one motorcyclist.

The bus company said it was unable to offer a breakdown of payouts, including from insurance claims, saying that “the categories of court judgments and settlements are inextricably linked, and, therefore, cannot be separated”.

The JUTC also reported that there was no backlog of compensation owed for crash-related civil lawsuits or civil claims on insurance.

“Settlements of judgments are paid by us within a two- or three-week period. The insurance companies, when they are involved, also have a similar turnaround time for payment once there is no issue,” Abrahams said.

The bus company has a fleet of approximately 500 buses, and as at the end of March, 147 buses were out of service “for the past 84 days at the very least”.

According to the company’s unaudited financial statements, fuel cost for financial year 2018-2019 increased by more than $1 billion.

It cost the JUTC just over $2.5 billion in 2018-2019 and $1.4 billion in the preceding year.

Maintenance expenses, which included bus parts and contract labour, amounted to more than $2.2 billion for both financial years.

The JUTC transports more than 200,000 people daily within the Kingston Metropolitan Transport Region, Spanish Town, and Portmore.