St Mary family sceptical of suicide claim after dad found hanging

The family of a St Mary man is dismissing suggestions from the police that their patriarch, Leric Silvera, killed himself last Thursday.

Silvera, 63, was discovered hanging by a length of rope from a tree in Crescent, a community near Jack's River.

According to the police's Corporate Communications Unit, Silvera allegedly texted his daughter earlier in the day and stated that he intended to take his life. However, family members are insisting this is not the case.

"That's a lie," one of Silvera's daughters, Tricia, told THE STAR.

She said that her father telephoned one of his sons at 3:26 on Thursday morning, after which he called her at 3:45.

LAST PHONE CALL

"Him call me and me open the line, mi nuh hear him," Tricia outlined. "Mi say 'Daddy,' him nuh answer. Mi say 'Daddy,' him answer. When him answer him say 'Hoy,' mi say wha do you now? Him say 'Mi have one likkle problem.' That's all mi hear from him. By the time mi fi say, whey uh deh? him hang up. Mi never have no credit fi call him back."

She said that Silvera's common-law wife called her elder sister later that morning and told her that he had left the house and could not be located.

Given the strange occurrence, family members set out to search for Silvera and found the body hanging around 5:15 a.m.

Tricia said her father's death hurts her deeply.

"Mi cyaa come to all now. It hurt mi wicked, wicked, wicked. I've never been through this, never know say time like this would a come. Di whole a wi -- grand pickney, daughter - everybody and him have good relationship. We call him if we have any problem an' we and him talk. Right now all the grand pickney dem bawl every minute," Tricia said.

"If you can find the next word fi sad, that's where it is," Tricia's husband Richie added.

Tricia said Father's Day was extremely painful.

"Yuh know it hurt fi know say mi cyaa call mi fada an' see mi fada and tell him 'Happy Father's Day?' An' him nuh do nobody nutten, bredda, and a this him get?

Mi fada nuh do nobody no wickedness, mi fada prefer gi yuh the laas wha him have and do without. An' him ever a smile, no care wha problem him have, him ever a smile," she said.

Another of Silvera's daughters, Keisha, also expressed how her father's death is affecting the entire family.

"We cyaa feel good over dis yah situation," Keisha said. "None a we, bredda an sista, nor nobody cannot feel good over this because this yah situation is not just like this, that a wha mi sure ah, mi nah ask."

"Mi fada walk all the way from Bonnie Gate come down, walk pass him house go round a bush? And [if] yuh look pon him clothes yuh not even see one burr pon him clothes. If a through the bush him walk then; so suppn nuh mus' wrong? That can't be natural," she argued.

"If him tek the bush from dung deh so, and walk gwope, him would a burr up. So dis cyaa right. But God a God," she said.

Rupert Wachope, one of Silvera's several siblings, described him as his favourite.

"And fi come get this news now and hear this, mi nuh feel good," Wachope said. "I'm not feeling well from I hear. Mi jus a wait fi God come tell me what cause it."

Police investigations continue into the incident.