PAINFUL - Family grieves for slain pregnant woman

Tashika McKay's four-year-old daughter would have had the title of 'big sister' in a few weeks, but she was robbed of the chance, as her mother, who was eight months pregnant, was killed on Father's Day in Rhoden Hall, Kellits, Clarendon.

Kerona McKay, Tashika's aunt, told THE STAR that it was the four-year-old who alerted them that something was wrong with her mother.

"Her daughter come and say I must come here let she show me something. She say 'Me a call me mother and she nah answer and when me look pan har, hair cream in har hair and pan har face," McKay shared. She said that dried blood was what the child referred to as hair cream. McKay said she screamed when she found her niece laying face down in a pool of blood. She admitted that she initially assumed Tashika had died from birth-related complications. Tashika's cousin Angella thought the same thing.

"I was saying to myself, wonder if she was having baby and nobody was there to help her so I hear everybody screaming and I realised Tashika died and I started to bawl ... it was not a normal bawl. It's the mercy of God that is carrying us now," Angella said. She said Tashika was a happy person who found solace in the simplest of things.

Her body print out in the mattress

"Me cyaa believe say Tashika nuh live fe have her baby... me cyaa believe," said Tashika's long-time friend, Melissa Mason. "A two mattress she have, enuh, and the two a dem soak wid blood. To how she bleed out yuh see her body print out in the mattress." The blood-stained reminders were burnt in the yard on Monday. Blood stains on a wall in her room told the tale of Tashika's horrific demise.

Meanwhile, Tashika's boyfriend, 20-year-old Markland Hayles, who was arrested in connection with her death, died in custody at the Lionel Town Police Station on Monday. Reports from the Lionel Town police are that about mid-morning, Hayles was found hanging with a piece of clothing tied around his neck. He was assisted to hospital where he was pronounced dead. The police say Hayles was initially taken to the hospital and treated for injuries he sustained from stones that were hurled by irate residents during his arrest on Sunday. One officer was also treated. He was then taken to the Lionel Town station. According to the police, Hayles confessed to the crime in a caution statement. The Independent Commission of Investigations is probing his death.