Triple murder brings back painful memories for woman

On May 28, 2008, two of Tenesha Moreland's siblings, Margarita Campbell and Leroy Moreland, were gunned down in their Allman Town, Kingston, community.

On Sunday, as she frantically carried three of the five gunshot victims who were attacked in the same place to hospital, she prayed their families would not experience similar pain.

"Mi feel bad, bad, bad. Same as how mi see one of them in the road lay down, a so mi did come out come see mi bredda lay down. One a the victim dem was carrying out mi sister and is the same thing mi see happen down the road and it was like history just a repeat itself," she said.

Campbell, Leroy and Kimani Holness were killed as they stood among a group of persons at a premises. A day later, gunmen invaded the same premises and killed another woman, Icylyn Reid.

Police have maintained a strong presence in Allman Town after four persons were murdered over 72 hours. The victims from Sunday's shooting, Raheim Brown, Konee Foster and Marvin Livingston, all of whom Moreland knew, were killed a few houses away from where her family lived.

"Di same way we a stop car and none nah stop and people just a look in shock, a di same ting with mi bredda. Is not like people never want to help eno, dem did wa help, but everybody traumatise because di whole ting just shocking," she said.

Hard-working single mother

Moreland described her sister as a hard-working single mother who tried her best to give her children everything, and said Leroy, a construction worker, was a jack of all trades.

Moreland says the family will never fully heal from the pain, but says they have found ways of coping.

Dr Orville Taylor, head of the Department of Sociology at The University of the West Indies (UWI), said one can never really understand the grief and pain associated with losing a loved one unless they have had a similar experience.

"One goes through a range of emotions when they lose a loved one. The least of all is sadness as there is the real fear where you think about reprisal and there is anger. I really don't know how well we are designed to deal with these things as humans," he said. He added that persons may just have to find comfort among themselves.

"We are not designed to try to cope on our own, it is just not what we do. A big part of what needs to happen though is at a community level where people just have to put their foot down and say enough is enough. People will make behavioural changes as a group when the consequences are not too great. There has to be some form of unity," he said.