Dear Editor,

It has taken me three weeks to pen this letter. This is largely due to the fact that the ghastly murder of my former classmate, Sasha-Gaye Livingston-Coffie, seemed like a bad dream. Perhaps, I thought, if enough time went by, it would not be true. But happen it did. On 21st October, a day reckoned as Heroes’ Day, despite her obviously advanced state of pregnancy, she was shot several times, including in her stomach.

Added to this shameful treatment at the hands of this heartless man, she was to face further indignities. The police car that arrived on the scene reportedly refused to take her to the hospital for fear that her innocent blood would tarnish the car seats. Life quickly escaping her compromised body, her family, still in fright over the gruesome event, had to wait for an open back police truck to take her to the Spanish Town Hospital. Her almost lifeless body was placed on the bed of the back of the vehicle that finally arrived on the death scene.

I understand how much we value aesthetics. Indeed, our streets are virtually litter free, our roads are among the most beautiful in the world, and our public facilities are above par. In the matter of life and death, though, I wonder how our police officers’ priorities can be so misplaced.

This is a matter that should outrage our sensibilities. Her blood stains in the back of the truck allowed to transport her might have already been washed clean, but the memory of her life and death will not fade. There was nothing heroic in how the police handled this situation, and we have to demand a higher standard from the Force, which claims: “we serve, we protect, we reassure with courtesy, integrity and proper respect for the rights of all’.

My heart bleeds for Jamaica. Yet, I fear that I might very well bleed to death.

Janene A. Laing

Advocat International

janene_laing@hotmail.com

www.advocatinternational.com

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