Thirteen homes in 16 years - police probe troubled teen's life

A 16-year-old Manchester girl who was reported missing last Friday was yesterday found safe in May Pen, Clarendon.

However, the teenager told the police that she was not missing, but had deliberately removed herself from where she was living with relatives for her own safety.

That has prompted the police to launch an investigation into her living circumstances.

Head of the Clarendon police, Superintendent Vendolyn Cameron-Powell, told THE STAR that it is likely that arrests would be made.

She said the girl was taken to a medical facility by the police and is okay. She added that the girl is in the custody of other family members and that her mother lives overseas.

NOW INVESTIGATING

When asked if the child indicated she was being abused at home, Cameron-Powell said: "I don't think it reached that state yet ... so we are now investigating to see."

However, when THE STAR contacted a family member who said she has been acting as the child's guardian since 2015, she said the girl is a troubled teen, who has been faced with neglect for most of her life, looking for love in the wrong places.

"Her mom left for England and leave her as a little girl here in Jamaica with a lady who happened to die. From there, she have the child living in many different homes with strangers. She has been to 13 different homes in her lifetime before she reached to my home. The little girl go through a lot of traumatisation," the relative said.

She said she gathered that the teen might have met a man online and had gone to stay with him.

"She tell me little girl that she find the love of her life and she not going to see her again," she said. The relative said entertainer Ninja Man, who is related to the child, made a request via video to send her home.

She believes the forceful manner in which he did it scared the alleged online suitor.

The relative further added that she has been trying her best to provide the teen with the love, care and support she desperately needs.

"I am the only one that make she feel like she have a mother around her. Me cook her dinner. Me see to it that she alright and gone to school. Sometimes me pass and touch her in her little hair and show her love. I counsel her and talk to her like my own child, but she feel like she big," the relative said.