At death’s door

On Sunday, November 28, 2021, Novelette Mighty was sitting in her vehicle at the Greenwich Town Fishing Village in Kingston, from which she ran a successful operation for years and served as president of the benevolent society, when a shadow at the door caught her attention. When she glanced up, Mighty found herself looking into the business end of a handgun.

Before she could react, there was a barrage of gunshots and she soon realised that she had been shot through the mouth.

With blood gushing from her mouth and her tongue going numb, Mighty looked around in consternation as the gunman turned back towards her and fired into the vehicle again. This time, a bullet pierced her upper body.

It was the start of a nightmare for the woman, who, for years, was active in beach activities and lobbied on behalf of her fellow fisherfolk.

Recalling the frightful ordeal, Mighty, who has gone into hiding, told The Sunday Gleaner that, for 2022, her solemn wish is to be allowed to return to some semblance of the normal life she once enjoyed.

“When mi look around fi someone fi help me, there was no one. Everybody gone left me,” she recalled as she related the experience over the phone.

SHATTERED

Worried that she could lose consciousness, the injured woman tried to turn over the ignition key, but her right hand, which had been shattered by the would-be assassin’s bullet, would not cooperate.

She then used her left hand to start the vehicle and sped off, determined to get to the Kingston Public Hospital (KPH).

Upon exiting the beach road, Mighty turned on the hazard lights and turned the vehicle against the traffic flow, heading towards downtown Kingston.

Using her left hand to steer, she almost crashed into an oncoming vehicle when she turned left at Industrial Terrace, but managed to right the vehicle after swerving and nearly losing control.

As she careened up Industrial Terrace, turning right at the traffic lights at the intersection with Spanish Town Road, the vehicle was travelling well in excess of 100 kilometres per hour, and when she took the left turn on to North Street at breakneck speed, she realised that she was in danger of being seen as a crazy driver.

As she flashed past the Jamaica Defence Force personnel manning the zone of special operations checkpoint in Denham Town, Mighty shouted to the startled soldiers, “Gunshot! Gunshot!”, never once easing up off the accelerator.

“When me reach a Public (KPH) door and park my vehicle, I take up my handbag, pick up mi phone and drop it inna the bag, put it pon mi shoulder and say to the porter, ‘Gunshot! Gunshot!’. Mi siddung inna the chair and a me go up on the emergency room bed and lay down,” she told The Sunday Gleaner.

As the attending physician asked quick-fire questions such as her name, address and the like, the injured woman calmly answered, but she almost lost it when he began sharing the details of his examination.

“She got one shot in the abdomen, one in her breast, one in her hand and in the foot,” she recalled the doctor saying.

Upon realising that she had been shot all over the body, Mighty began to fear that she might have lost a lot of blood, and, for the first time since her ordeal began, allowed herself to entertain the thought that she might succumb to her injuries.

Still, she refused to panic and asked the doctor if she was going to be alright.

“Pray to God,” he reportedly responded, and she replied that she had always put Him first.

As she wondered about the potential blood loss and damage to her internal organs, Mighty’s spirit was lifted when the lead physician declared to his colleagues in a brisk tone, “Vitals are okay”, indicating all her vital signs were fine.

One of the bullets shattered the bones in the right hand and corrective surgery involving the placement of pins is planned. The one which hit her in the head took with it four teeth, and, for that, she needs more surgery. All the other bullets went clean through her body and did no irreparable damage.

GIVING THANKS

As she recuperates in hiding, the businesswoman is giving thanks to God and to the team of medical practitioners who attended her, still fearful that the persons who orchestrated the attempt on her life may try again.

Since then, Mighty, who has been a long-standing activist for development of the fishing village and improvement in the welfare of every member of the fishing community, has learnt that she was wrongly accused of paying someone to kill a man, whose life was snuffed out while she was abroad a few months before she was shot.

In a previous interview with The Gleaner, Mighty had recalled that, in the past, the Greenwich Town Village had been under the control of thugs, who took advantage of the friction between the fisherfolk and the Marine Police. However, a series of meetings had resulted in the tension mellowing out and the fisherfolk and the police – marine and land – now work together to keep their beach free of criminal activities.

Over the years, as the fishing community evolved into a more structured organisation with the assistance of the Jamaica Social Investment Fund, The University of the West Indies and other organisations, the fisherfolk were now required to comply with rules and regulations in conducting their trade.

The man she is accused of ordering a hit for is someone with whom she had frequently butted heads, as he insisted in doing things the old-fashioned way, Mighty said, pointing to why she believed she is being wrongly targeted.

“I am being targeted, blamed for what I have not done, and to all those people targeting me, I am innocent,” she stressed, adding that the man in question was no saint and in all likelihood was slain by his cronies.

Now, she said, she is being deprived of a normal life and livelihood.

“All I want back is my life – to be happy and free to love my grandchildren. Mi want back me life. Mi innocent. Mi nuh know nutten about that man’s death. Why unnu target me?” she asked, her voice cracking from the effort of holding back the threatening flood of tears.

christopher.serju@gleanerjm.com