Mom wails for 13-y-o slain on way to school
The rural community of Refuge, near Duncans in Trelawny, has again been plunged into mourning, following the murder of a teenaged girl, less than a year after a 16-y-o girl was abducted from her home and killed.
The brutal murder of the 13-year-old schoolgirl in Trelawny last week, has left her family and the community of Refuge, traumatized and police baffled.
The body of 13-year-old Aleisha Brown, also called ‘Miss Chin’ of Refuge District near Duncans in Trelawny, was found in bushes about two miles from her home in the neighbouring community of Douglas Castle.
Residents of Refuge who had formed their own search team for the teen who went missing after she left home on Monday morning at about 5:30 for classes at Muschett High School in Wakefield, some 15 miles away, made the gruesome discovery two days later.
CONCERN
Brown was on the morning shift and relatives say it is customary for the teen to leave home about 5:30 a.m. and make the trek down a path to a nearby bus stop. It is still not clear if Brown made it to the bus stop last Monday morning.
Her mother, Stacy Douglas, became concerned later that day when her daughter did not return home from school at the usual time. Calls were placed to the school and it was revealed that the child, who was in grade 8, had not shown up for classes.
It is reported that Ms. Douglas filed a missing person’s report to the Duncans Police Station that same afternoon. The mother and her relatives mobilized a team and they immediately began searching for the girl.
The teen’s body was discovered two days later on Wednesday, October 1, in bushes near the Douglas Castle Great House. North Coast Times was told that the body was still clad in the girl’s maroon and white uniform. An old vehicle tyre was used to cover the body which had a wound to the head. (blurb))))
Unconfirmed reports are that the child was sexually assaulted. Residents believe the teen never made it out of her community and was killed by someone known to her.
The gruesome discovery was too much for the teen’s mother. The woman could not contain her grief and wept bitterly even as relatives and friends, themselves weeping, tried to console her.
“Me want me pickney, Jesus Christ, me want mi pickney, Oh God, me want me pickney,” the distraught mother wailed. “Me want me baby, me want me baby. Mek me go look, me waah see mi pickney.”
A close friend of the distraught woman said the teen was a very quiet child who gave no worries and did not deserve such an awful death. Tracey-Ann Eldermire said the entire community was shaken by the murder of the child.
GOOD LITTLE GIRL
“Miss Chin is a good little girl, nobody nuh have nuh trouble wid har, no problems at all,” Ms. Eldermire said. “When me go visit har mother me neva hear har mother sey she do this or do that, she is a good little girl.”
As news of Ms Chin’s death reached Muschett High, several students broke down in tears. One of the school’s vice principals, Albert Thompson said at least three children, one of them a cousin to Brown, had to be sent home.
The Education Minister, Rev. Ronald Thwaites, described Brown’s death as a ghastly act. He said the community should come together and help the police bring the girl’s killer to justice. Counsellors were dispatched to the school.
Meanwhile, as the community tries to recover from the murder, members of the parish Neighbourhood Watch Council and the Community, Safety and Security branch of the Trelawny Police held a prayer vigil in the community on Sunday night, October 5.
“Dem a kill off we pickney dem and we nah kill nobody and the police dem nah do nothing ‘bout it,” one woman said last Wednesday as investigators began their probe into Brown’s murder.
Investigators are yet to make a breakthrough into the murder.
Residents say they have still not recovered from the murder of another schoolgirl whose body was also found in bushes last year.
Sixteen-year-old Abigail Robb, a grade 11 student at Holland High, was found in bushes five days after gunmen abducted her from her house in Refuge.
-30-
