PROSPECT, St Mary — The body of a man, believed to be mentally ill, was found with multiple chop wounds on the Tower Isle main road in St Mary last Friday morning, just one week after a similar discovery near the shipping pier in Ocho Rios.

The Prospect police reported that the body of 41 year-old David Edwards, otherwise called “Collie Bud”, of Charles Town District, St Mary, was discovered at around 7:30 am. There were chop wounds to his head, neck, left ankle and left elbow.

On Friday, March 28, the body of 29 year-old Michael McLean, of Colegate, St Ann — who was also said to be mentally ill — was found, also with chop wounds.

One man has been detained in connection with McLean’s murder.

But according to investigating police officer, Detective Corporal Spencer Robinson of the Prospect police, there does not appear to be any connection between the two murders.

‘I doubt that there is any link,” Robinson told the Observer Friday.

According to the police, Edwards was last seen alive as he walked towards Tower Isle Friday morning at about 6:30. An hour later, his body was found in bushes along the road. The police, who say they have no leads so far, estimate that Edwards was killed some time between 6:45 and 7:30 Friday morning.

The second machete slaying in a week has left some residents of Ocho Rios questioning the motive behind the attacks on the two men. Some have gone as far as to suggest that there might be some sinister plot to rid the tourist resort of street people, as was the intention in Montego Bay in July 1999 when 32 mentally ill and homeless persons were forcibly removed from the resort city’s streets and dumped in St Elizabeth, more than 50 miles south.

But when contacted Friday, the St Ann Health Department downplayed the incident, claiming that neither of the slain men could be readily identified as being mentally ill and their status would have had to be verified.