The chopping of two cousins last Tuesday night, May 2 in Stewart Town, St Mary, which left one person dead, has caused great pain and hurt to family and community members.
Dead is 23-year-old Jovane Smith, otherwise called ‘Chin,’ a labourer of Comma in Mango Valley, St Mary.
Simms’ cousin, Andrenick Buchanan, 23, otherwise called ‘Nick’, also of Comma is hospitalized at the Kingston Public Hospital (KPH) with chop wounds and is faced with the harsh reality of not using his left hand again due to a vicious chop he received.
The aunt of the two cousins, Yvonne McDonald, who works at a restaurant in the area, was still hurt on Friday, May 5, when The Times visited her. She is still asking why anyone would want to harm her nephews, especially Jovane Smith, who had a speech and physical impairment. The latter affected his walking.
Despite the fact that a person of interest has been taken into the custody of the St Mary police on Thursday, May 4, Ms McDonald is still hurting.
“Still feel hurt… Mi still hurt. Mi lose mi nephew mi love. Him (Jovane Smith) nuh hundred like the others. Weh yuh kill him fah? Him can’t even fight yuh like the others. Him can’t even run…. A feel it to mi heart,” Ms McDonald explained.
COMING TO RESTAURANT
Both Javane Simms and Andrenick Buchanan worked as labourers in Rio Nuevo and it was their regular routine to get food from the restaurant their aunt worked in Stewart Town. They would later leave and go on their way as Jovane Simms slept at his work place in Rio Nuevo, during the weekdays and returned home to Comma in Mango Valley on the weekend. His other cousin would make the trip home daily.
On Tuesday night, May 2, at around 7 p.m., Simms and Buchanan were on their usual journey to their aunt’s restaurant.
They had stopped at a supermarket close by to the restaurant to purchase items and were on their way to the eatery, when destiny took an eerie course.
The cousin’s aunt, Ms McDonald recounted what the surviving cousin of the machete attack told family members from hospital.
“The one at the hospital (Andrenick Buchanan) tell we say that they were walking coming down and him (Buchanan) only feel something chop him in his head and when him spin around, him see the cutlass a come again and him put him hand fi block it (the cutlass). After him block it, him spin around and run come down this way and when him a run dem chop him in his back again,” Ms McDonald explained.
CRYING OUT
Ms McDonald pointed out that on the evening in question she was sitting down at the restaurant and Simms’ brother told her that he saw that Buchanan had ran down the road with what appeared to be blood on his hand caused by chop wounds inflicted by someone.
“So mi ran outside now and mi say ‘weh Nick, weh Nick’ and somebody say to mi say ‘see the next one over there so deh.’ So mi run and a so mi start cry because mi see him (Jovane Simms’) foot and mi know say a him. So mi start bawl and when mi go over deh and mi see mi nephew and mi shake him and see that the whole a him neck cut out. It cut right out,” Ms McDonald reflected.
The area along the roadside where young Jovane Simms had collapsed with the chop wound to his neck was right across from the restaurant she worked.
She said she started to cry and said: “A weh him (Javane Simms) do? Him nuh do nobody nothing, because dem cling to dem one another…”
Ms McDonald said that the other cousin, Andrenick Buchanan later collapsed in the road and it was a woman that knew him that rescued him and took him to the Port Maria Hospital. He was later transferred to the Kingston Public Hospital.
“The pickney dem (Simms and Buchanan) a innocent pickney dem and yuh kill one fi wah?” Ms McDonald questioned angrily.
QUIET LITTLE BOY
Simms, who was to celebrate his 24th birthday in November, was described by his aunt as a quiet little boy, who did not talk much.
“Jovane is a quiet little boy, because when him born he didn’t born dat good…. He didn’t talk until he was 13, when he speak little word. Up until this blessed moment, he still could not talk good, so he can’t talk more than so. Him do less talking. You call to him and him just laugh and gone… Him couldn’t even walk properly. I know he died innocently. I don’t know why they kill him,” Ms McDonald said, sadly.
She said that the family is also saddened at the death, but she is trying her best to be strong for other family members. She added that for especially Simms’ mother, who was hospitalized before his chopping death, she had been crying a lot since she heard the tragic news.
Members of the Stewart Town community are also angered at the gruesome manner in which Simms was killed.
Several gruesome pictures of Simms lying dead had been making his rounds on social media, with the juice he had bought at the supermarket still lying on the ground next to his lifeless body.
This all signified a bitter end for a young man that was quiet and innocent, who did not let his disabilities, stand in the way of him earning an honest living.
