Juror’s sudden death throws wife into shock

IN A matter of hours, Tricia Fagan’s life was turned upside down.

One moment, the Sherwood Content, Trelawny, native was going about her regular, daily activities.

The next, she was grieving upon discovering that her husband of one and a half years, 46-year-old Louie, had collapsed and died suddenly on Thursday while serving as a juror at the Trelawny Circuit Court in Duncans.

“When mi get di call dem neva tell mi say him dead. Can you imagine what mi feel when mi reach hospital an find out say him dead?” she questioned.

Louie was one of seven jurors serving on a case for which a man is charged with grievous sexual assault, buggery and having sex with a minor.

From day one, Tricia says her husband was never interested in serving as a juror and that is complicating her feeling about his sudden passing.

Worse yet, Louie has had an uneasy feeling while dealing with this particular case, suffering from several bouts of headache.

On occasion, she even advised her partner to get a checkup but he was non-compliant.

“Mi nuh know what fi say. Him never want to be no juror. From the case start, him start complain ‘bout headache. Mi tell him fi go a doctor, but him say him alright. See it deh now, him dead,” Tricia said with sadness in her voice.

Louie had five children, the last a toddler for whom Tricia will only be able to share the memories of dad’s deeds.

“Him have five children but this little one a go grow up nuh know no father,” Tricia shared, adding that she had a good relationship with his other children.

Like her, news of their father’s sudden and unusual passing has left them without words and loss of spirit.

“Mi an him other pickney dem move good an mi nuh see dem face, but dem voice tell mi say dem not taking it too well,” Tricia told The Gleaner yesterday.

It’s a fact brought out in one of his daughters’ refusal to comment, as she was in shock and in no mood to talk.

At the court, personnel working at the time said as word spread about the incident, there was much panic with persons trying to help, even though the situation did not look promising from the outset.

“I never saw him faint,” an inspector of police told The Gleaner, noting that it was his first experience of that nature.

“When I went into the room, him never look good. I made arrangements to have him taken to the Duncans Health Clinic. Later, I heard he died,” he lamented.

“Mi neva come close to having that kind of experience before,” the inspector added.

A probation officer who works closely with the court system said he was convinced of Louie’s fate having got his first look.

“When it happened, people just a run up and down,” he told The Gleaner. “When I looked at him, I could [see he was] dead.”

editorial@gleanerjm.com