POLICE shot and killed Ricardo Reid, 19, and allegedly took two guns from his body in Willowdene, Spanish Town, yesterday morning.

According to the police, cops from the Spanish Town station responded to a call that a break-in was taking place in the Willowdene area. When the officers arrived, they saw Reid walking in bushes near to the area. An officer, the police said, approached Reid and attempted to apprehend him when he allegedly pulled two pistols — a Sig Sauer .40 and a Smith and Wesson .45 and fired two shots at the officers, who returned the fire. Reid was later found suffering from gunshot wounds and was taken to the Spanish Town Hospital where he later died.

Reid, police say, was facing charges of carnal abuse in the Spanish Town Resident Magistrate’s Court.

In Willowdene yesterday, residents did not counter the police account of the killing and no one seemed to be mourning for Reid, who lived with an elderly man said to be visually impaired.

“This time the police are telling the truth. I see when the little boy pop off and fire after the policeman and I see when the police shot him and take off two gun,” one resident said.

Reid was among a group of gangsters who were committing criminal acts in the area and yesterday morning’s robbery was the second to take place at that premises in weeks, according to another resident. The resident said that at about 2.45 am yesterday morning, a group of four men were seen trying to break into a van that was parked in a yard in the area. The men reportedly forced open the side windows of the minibus and stole a quantity of goods.

“The dead boy don’t run cause him know the area and a try make him way home like a gal yard him a come from. The rest a dem jump inna the car and gone longtime but him a lurks round like him want dead,” one resident said, adding that many residents in the area were glad that a criminal was removed from their midst.

Yesterday’s gun find brings the tally of guns seized by the police this year to 260.

Meanwhile, residents of Valdez Avenue, in the Homestead area of St Catherine, blocked a section of the old Harbour Main Road yesterday morning in protest against the arrest of a man by the Spanish Town police.

The Spanish Town police say the man who is being held, is wanted for shooting and robbery and will undergo an identification parade.