Promising Ronaldinho among two people killed in St James
Published:Monday | September 16, 2024 | 12:06 AMAdrian Frater/Gleaner Writer
Western Bureau:
In a March 2016 Gleaner article, published under the headline, ‘Overwhelming GSAT optimism out west’, a then 12-year-old Ronaldinho ‘Mike’ Headley, who was a student at Hampden Primary School, on the Trelawny-St James border, was featured.
Ronaldinho, who had emerged from the mathematics segment of the examination quite relieved, confident and happy, saying it was not a major challenge, was full of hope, and so was his mother Natasha Wilson, who was impressed with how focused her son was.
On Friday night, the now 20-year-old Ronaldinho, who had transitioned into being a graphic designer, was one of two people murdered by marauding gunmen in Hurlock, St James. During the incident, which took place at two separate locations, two other people were shot and injured.
The second person who was killed was identified as Oniel ‘Red Neck’ Howe, the operator of the shop, where one of the incidents took place. Other people suffered minor injuries as they fled the scene.
According to police reports, about 8 p.m., a group of people were at a shop in Hurlock when a grey Toyota Axio motor car pulled up and several men alighted with guns in hand. They reportedly opened gunfire indiscriminately. Howe was killed and two other men injured.
The police were summoned and, while they were at Howe’s shop processing that scene, they heard gunshots being fired in another section of the community. On investigation, Ronaldinho was found suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. He was rushed to hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Reprisal attempt
While it remains unclear why Ronaldinho was killed, based on information, the target of the shooting at Howe’s shop was reportedly a man who is said to have stabbed a relative of a top-flight gangster. He was reportedly in the shop at the time of the incident, but escaped without injuries.
While Superintendent Eron Samuels, the police commander for St James, has launched several bold initiatives to blunt the lawlessness in the parish, arresting several top-flight gangsters, including the parish’s most wanted man, Joseph ‘Gio’ McKenzie, who is now facing multiple murder charges, gangsters continue to push the parish’s murder tally closer to 100 since the start of the year with each new attack.
On Thursday, 28-year-old Taul ‘Nataniel’ Wynter, a resident of the volatile Katon Lane community in Mt Salem, was shot and killed before scores of pedestrians on Barnett Street, in Montego Bay, as he sat in the back of a taxi at a popular location.
St James has been under the gun since 2005, registering more than 100 murders every year, which included a high of 344 in 2016. Over the years, the parish has instituted several policing measures, including bouts of states of emergency (SOE) but, except for periods of lull, the mayhem continues.