TEARS flowed down the cheeks of Ronaldo Simpson as he told the story of how he and his 12-year-old brother witnessed the brutal murder of their father, Rohan Simpson, and his friend Moses Francis Saturday night.

It was just minutes before nine and he was about to go downstairs to get dinner from his grandmother when he said he saw men running up the stairs towards him and he ran inside a room. Another friend who was in the house at the time climbed onto a section of the roof and ran to safety.

“I was going to follow but said ‘no, maybe the men will see me and shoot me,” he said.

He ran back into the room and his brother hid behind the door. Francis, also in the room, stooped beside a bed but was seen by the gunmen who shot him several times through a window.

Simpson, who will celebrate his 16th birthday next month, was lucky to escape with his life: “Mi did think the man dem did a go kill me and my brother,” he told the Jamaica Observer yesterday.

Police said that the two men were shot and killed in gang violence about 8:45 Saturday night in August Town, St Andrew, shattering the tenuous peace which had been holding for sometime now. Rohan Simpson, 39, otherwise called ‘Troy’ and ‘Bat’, and Moses Francis, died on the spot.

The security forces were last night continuing their search for the gunmen and patrolling the area to prevent further outbreaks.

Rehashing the horrors of the night, Simpson said the gunmen chased his father, who ran into the adjoining room and shoved a chest of drawers behind the door.

He listened as the men kicked open the door, firing several shots as they made their way into the room. Bullet holes in the wall remained a grim testimony of a hellish night.

Terise, who also lives in the house, said she and her sister were preparing to go to a nightclub when she saw Rohan Simpson run into the room and heard shots being fired.

She hid in the bathtub with her sister, clutching her four-year-old son close to her, her hand tightly clapsed over his mouth. She saw the elder Simpson’s body jerk as he was shot several times in the head and body. Her son was grazed on the hand and back by bullets meant for Simpson.

“When I heard the shots, I started crying out, ‘di pickney dem, di pickney dem’,” she said, hoping to keep the gunmen from coming into the bathroom. “And my sister start crying out ‘Please, please’,” Terise said.

Sixty-one-year-old, Audrey, who lives downstairs, also received a wound to her left breast as the gunmen shot off the lock to her door, attempting to gain entry.

Yesterday, Minister of National Security Peter Bunting and Commissioner of Police Owen Ellington toured the area to reassure the residents.

Just mere hours before Simpson and Francis were killed, 23-year-old Devon Harris and 19-year-old Onieff Bennett were also shot and killed in another area of August Town.

Police are unable to say whether the incidents are connected.

Eastern St Andrew Member of Parliament Andre Hylton, who came out to comfort members of the community, said he was saddened by the gruesome incidents.

“The people in August Town have been doing their best to maintain peace. Various groups, such as the PMI (Peace Management Initiative), the police, the university and other stakeholders have been working very hard to get August Town to that place where we think it deserves to be,” he said.

He called on the police in the area to be more responsive to the citizens of the community.

“The citizens of August Town are tired of their children being killed, they are tired of gang warfare, they want to live a normal life,” Hylton said.

Hylton said he would be having discussions with Bunting and Ellington to look at a new approach to dealing with crimes in August Town.

The councillor for the area, Venecia Phillips, said “I know that this community is being brought to its knees by criminality.” She also suggested that the local police was stretched to its limit and lacked the support of the divisional headquarters.

“I don’t believe sufficient support has been given to the police of August Town. Try as they might, they can’t police every single place as they have flare-ups,” Phillips added.

Meanwhile, Terise and other persons who occupy the house that was raided, are packing up to leave the community that has now put them in fear for their lives.

Young Simpson, clearly overwhelmed by grief over the loss of his father, commented: “It rough on the family. Only we and we grandma are left. First they killed my uncle and my grandfather went away, now dem kill my father so nobody is here. It just rough on the family”.