News Briefs

Yallahs High closed after student positive for COVID

Yallahs High has shut down face-to-face classes for this week after a grade 10 student tested positive for the novel coronavirus.

End-of-term examinations that were scheduled to commence today, February 1, have been postponed.

The student last attended school on January 15 and has remained away from school since. However, administrators have called off in-person sessions because two siblings of the student also attend the school.

Deep cleaning and sanitisation will commence, and all classes will be conducted online until further notice.

"We apologise to all our stakeholders for the inconvenience that our closure may have caused," said Mark Malabver, principal of Yallahs High.

"However, we believe that this step is necessary in order to protect the health and safety of all stakeholders."

'Dudus' crony shot dead

Harry McLeod, more widely known as ‘Harry Dog’, the reputed ex-lieutenant of drug kingpin Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke, was shot dead in downtown on Sunday.

McLeod, 51, was shot several times by unknown assailants at the intersection of Darling Street and Spanish Town Road.

News of the killing caused jitters in the west Kingston community of Tivoli Gardens, where he wielded significant power as Coke’s right-hand man.

Already, the Kingston West police are grappling with a significant increase in murders and shootings this year.

In the first 29 days of this year, 15 murders were recorded across communities that fall within the division - 12 more than over the comparative period last year, according to police statistics.

The police have not identified a suspect or motive for McLeod’s killing.

In 2015, McLeod was freed from charges of receiving a stolen motor vehicle, forgery, and larceny in relation to a car found in Tivoli Gardens with more than 4,000 rounds of ammunition during the May 2010 police-military operation in the community to arrest Coke.

Coke, who was wanted by United States authorities at the time, was convicted in the US in 2011 and is serving a 23-year prison sentence.

Two killed in Clarendon

Two persons, a woman and a man, were killed in the community of Race Track on the outskirts of May Pen in Clarendon on Sunday morning.

Dead are 55-year-old Careen Walters, otherwise called ‘Paula’, a security guard, and a man known only as ‘Jermaine’, both of Sunset Gardens in Race Track.

The May Pen police told the news team that about 12:10 a.m., residents heard explosions and alerted them. When they arrived, Walters and Jermaine were found with gunshot wounds to the upper body. They were both taken to hospital, where they were pronounced dead.

The police have not yet established a motive for the killings.