Two killed as guns bark in MoBay
Published:Friday | June 4, 2021 | 12:11 AMHopeton Bucknor/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
The unending gang feud in sections of Glendevon, St James, has claimed two more lives as gangsters continue to wreak havoc in the community, which has been witnessing on-and-off bouts of extreme violence in recent years.
The latest victims are 31-year-old wrecker operator Vernon ‘Punch’ Boswell, who was killed shortly before 10 a.m. yesterday, and Andre ‘Bones’ Simpson, who was shot dead on Wednesday.
Two men are also nursing gunshot wounds arising from the two incidents.
In yesterday’s incident, Boswell was standing between an auto-parts shop and a garage owned and operated by his family at the intersection of Johnson Hill and the Sun Valley main road when a white Toyota Corolla motor car pulled up. Two men reportedly alighted with guns in hand and chased Boswell close to 70 metres, firing a barrage of shots at him.
In trying to jump across a drain, Boswell fell, and one of the gunmen stood over him and fired multiple shots at his head, killing him on the spot.
Following the shooting, the men ran from the garage, firing more shots as they headed back to the getaway car, which sped away.
Boswell was discovered dead, and another person suffered a bullet wound to one of his knees.
“It was a terrible scene, and it all happened right there in from of the man’s mother,” a person claiming to have witnessed the incident told The Gleaner.
In Wednesday’s incident, which occurred about 4 p.m., Simpson, who is of a Cornwall Courts address in St James, was among a group of persons at a section of Norwood called Jungle when a group of men travelling in a Toyota Noah van drove by and opened fire, hitting Simpson and another man.
They were taken to hospital, where he was pronounced dead and the other man admitted.
The police believe that Boswell’s killing was an act of reprisal for Simpson’s murder.
“It would appear that both shooting incidents are linked, and also that [Thursday’s] incident was an act of reprisal for Wednesday’s shooting in Norwood,” an investigator told The Gleaner. “The police have carried out a number of operations in both communities following the shootings, and several persons of interest have been picked up and are presently being questioned.”
St James has been seeing an upsurge in gun murders over recent weeks, with four persons being shot and killed over the past seven days. A total of 74 persons have been murdered in the parish since the start of the year.