This is the fourth in a series recounting close encounters with death by Jamaicans, some of them in prominent positions of society.

JULIET Cuthbert’s good name and athletic exploits for Jamaica spared her possible harm, maybe even death, at the hands of gunmen during a hold-up in downtown Kingston 10 years ago.

The incident, in the tough Southside area of Central Kingston, came a decade after the diminutive sprinter did her country proud with silver medal performances in the 100 metres and 200 metres at the Olympic Games held in the Spanish city of Barcelona.

The chilling ordeal of having to look at the business end of a gun for the first time had Cuthbert’s internal stopwatch counting down to what she felt then was her certain death.

“I was going to GraceKennedy (along Harbour Street) because I was planning to do a charity event and I wrote a letter to them and had a meeting to go in and speak about possibly giving some money for the charity that I was planning,” recalled Cuthbert, now the managing director of Cuthbert’s Fitness Studio in Kingston.

“I parked my car right at an open lot and it was in the middle of the day, around 12:30, so I thought it was OK. I saw some people in an alley, kind of a lane and I went in (to GraceKennedy).

“On my way back out, going to my car, I saw a guy started walking towards me and he went in his waist, pulled out a gun and he pointed the gun at me and said don’t move, don’t move, don’t move.

“I froze… I was just like ‘OK, I’m going to die!’ And I can’t believe that I had just moved back to Jamaica and I am going to die. I am going to be shot,” Cuthbert stated.

Not even a full year had passed since she had moved back to Jamaica, having lived in the United States for over 20 years, and it was the first time that she had been subjected to anything of the kind, making the ordeal even more horrific.

“He walked towards me, kept the gun pointed at me, and by this time I am looking around. There was another guy at the side of the building, like a lookout guy, and he had his hand in his waist.

“I saw some other people just standing around in the lane, and then what struck me was this little ‘big-belly’ boy… he had no shirt on. He had just underwear and he could not have been more than just eight. He was just standing there witnessing all of this while this man was holding me up. The man came up, grabbed my bag and asked me for money, and I said I had no money in my bag — and I really didn’t because I don’t usually walk with money,” she said.

“So he opens my car door, proceeded to go into the car, ransacking the car and throwing things around. By this time, another youngster, about 13 or 14, came and grabbed my cellphone. I was like, ‘OK, it’s a cheap phone it doesn’t matter, I don’t need it anyway’. So he took my phone and I am standing there really thinking ‘what’s going to happen to me?’ I don’t have any money and these guys are probably going to kill me right here,” the retired athlete, who turns 48 next month, told the Sunday Observer.

Though armed with a gun, the aggressor was apparently taking no chances as he enquired whether she had a pistol in her Honda motor car.

“The man with the gun proceeded to go through the car and then he starts asking me if I had a gun.

“He said, do you have a gun and I said no, I don’t even like guns. He started looking under my car seat and in the glove compartment and I figured he was still looking for a gun and I am thinking, he’s not going to find any gun, he is not going to find any money under my car seat, what’s next? Is he going to let me go or what?

“I keep telling him that there is no gun in my car. By this time the other guy is gone with my cellphone and I am still standing there while he is going through my bag. He took everything out of my purse and threw them all over the car. “I was married at the time, so I looked at my wedding band and said, OK, maybe I will give him my wedding ring, so maybe he will leave me alone as I had nothing else to give.

“So I said to him ‘if you want I could give you the ring’, and he just looked at it. It was a white gold ring, so I guess he was not interested because it was white gold.

“I said, ‘Well, if you want money, I can take you to an ATM and get you some money, because I don’t want to die’. And he looked at me really weird and I am just standing there not knowing what next was going to happen and just very scared,” Cuthbert said.

When it appeared that things were getting desperate and her options were running out, Cuthbert dug deep into her arsenal of alternatives.

She had to convince the gunman not to shoot her, or harm her in any way, and there appeared to be only one way out.

“My friends had said to me before, ‘why are you moving back to Jamaica, it’s such a violent place, what if somebody holds you up’? And I would just joke, ‘well, if somebody holds me up, I will just say who I am and they will probably let me go’. And that came back to my mind and I told him, ‘OK, for whatever it’s worth, my name is Juliet Cuthbert, I am asking you please not to hurt me, etc, etc’. He looked at me and goes ‘Cuthbert, Cuthbert, I know that name. I know you, I know you’, and I saw everything started changing. His whole demeanour changed and the gun went from wherever it was to downward or wherever he put it,” added Cuthbert.

The others started to hand back items that they had relieved her of.

“The little boy who took my phone brought it back to me and gave it to me and I was like, ‘thank you’.

“He (gunman) started explaining to me, he said: ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, but times are so hard’ and I said, ‘yeah, I understand that times are so hard’, and I said [to myself] ‘OK, I’m off the hook, he’s going to let me go’. He kept apologising to me and then he said, ‘OK’ and I got back my key, went in the car and before I left in the car he waved to me and I waved back.”

However, the psychological effects were about to start hitting her.

“I went in the car and by the time I reached about 300 metres, it all hit me what had just happened, and I said, ‘Oh my God, I almost died a while ago’.

“I just started bawling, screaming in the car. I didn’t know a lot of people in Jamaica as I had just moved back and then I called a friend of mine and said, ‘I was just held up and I don’t know what to do and it was in the middle of the day’ and stuff like that,” Cuthbert related.

“So I went to a police station, reported it and it was like they didn’t even take a statement or anything. Nothing really. They just kind of looked at me in a sense, so nothing really came out of it and I came away traumatised for a good two years,” she disclosed.

That trauma would result in irregular behaviour, even when danger was far away.

For some years after, she would not drive past the road on which the incident occurred, even if she had pressing business in that section of the city, and other things began to affect her as well.

“One day I was in my car and this man in a Toyota Prado in the lane next to me bent down to do something in his car and I looked over and saw him going down and I thought he was getting a gun. I started screaming in my car and just pressed on the gas and went through the red light,” she said.

“Another time this man was walking on the street and he was coming towards me with his cellphone in his waist, he goes in his waist and I just went absolutely crazy on the road.

“So everytime I see something bulging from somebody’s pocket, I would get very, very afraid. It took me about two years to get over all of that trauma and realise that everybody doesn’t have a gun and everybody isn’t trying to hold me up, but it was very traumatic,” the Olympian admitted.

“Things got easier for me. When I see people coming towards me I wouldn’t be so nervous, or if somebody bent down, I look a certain way, I was always on the lookout for somebody trying to hold me up,” Cuthbert said.

The experience was something that she had least imagined, moreso considering the fact that she had been one of Jamaica’s star athletes over the years.

“I didn’t expect this to happen to anyone really. I guess I had thought that people would probably recognise me and wouldn’t try to hold me up, because they love athletes and you have done something for the country, not that gunmen or gunwomen really care. Once they are going to rob you or do something to you, it doesn’t really matter. I guess I felt a little better knowing that I told him my name and he recognised my name and from there he kind of just let me go,” she said.

The first thought that entered her mind minutes after the incident was to leave Jamaica and resettle in the United States, something that many Jamaicans who have had similar experiences have resorted to.

At the time of the incident, Cuthbert was a co-host on KLAS Sports Radio’s discussion programme, Scoreboard. She recalled arriving at the Haining Road location of the station on the same Wednesday afternoon, 30 minutes before the 4 o’clock start of the four-hour show, but could not sit in front of the microphone to interact with callers and sports officials.

“I just could not do the programme that day. I freaked out,” she admitted. “Right then and there, I thought about moving back to the US immediately, because my son was also here, so I was also very afraid for him that if this could happen to me, he is in school, anything could happen to him and I would rather something happen to me than him. And so people kept saying, just wait it out and stay, but I ended up sending him back to the United States and I stayed, never at all convinced that I should go back, but I was convinced that he needed not to be here,” she said.

Protecting herself against possible incidents in the future was the next item on Cuthbert’s agenda. At least, she thought about giving herself a fighting chance, should another incident of similar nature arise.

Getting a gun was considered, but that, too, in her estimation, had its disadvantages.

“I have thought about getting guns to protect myself, but with the way I am I don’t think I need a gun,” she stated.

“I am one of those people who will actually use a gun. There are so many people who have guns and don’t have the time to use them, and if they find that you have a gun, they will probably hurt you, so there is a deterrent there for me not to have one,” she said.

“You hear of people saying that they have a gun and they get frightened. I have heard of an incident where a police lady got held up and she was so stunned that she couldn’t use her firearm. Me now, I would not be stunned. If someone comes and threatens my life, I know I would use it,” she said.

Martial arts too, as a form of self-defence, was also contemplated.

“I have thought about doing martial arts, just for self-defence, just to protect myself, because you do encounter people with knives rather than guns sometimes, and if somebody stepped up to me with a knife, I think I know how to handle myself,” Cuthbert said.