MONTEGO BAY, St James —Delapenha’s Funeral Home is underwriting the costs associated with the funeral for three-year-old Leashay Thomas, who was allegedly murdered by her father in April.

Leashay’s body was found at the popular Dump Up Beach in Montego Bay hours after a man purporting to be her father reportedly called a relative, advising that he had killed the little girl and had thrown her body into the sea at the popular Montego Bay beach.

Days later, the child’s father, Roosevelt Thomas, alias ‘Timmy’, a resident of Flanker in St James, who reportedly took Leashay from her home in Flower Hill hours before her demise, turned himself in at the Barnett Street Police Station in the parish.

But police said he later escaped custody by jumping through a window at the police station where he was being questioned in connection with his daughter’s killing.

Hours later his bullet-riddled body was discovered in an abandoned house along Joan’s Avenue in Glendevon, St James.

The Jamaica Observer West understands that an arrest is yet to be made in connection with the suspected murder of Thomas.

Yesterday, Leashay’s grandmother Marie Clarke told the Observer West that the family is still hurting from the tragic loss of her granddaughter, even as she expressed gratitude to Delapenha’s Funeral Home for underwriting the costs associated with the funeral.

“We are still grieving, but at the same time we are very, very grateful that Delapenha is taking care of the funeral expenses, because financially we don’t have it,” said Clarke.

Managing director of Delapenha’s Funeral Home, Dale Delapenha, pointed out that the assistance being given by his company to the family of the little girl will include the preparation of the body, provision of casket, wreaths, funeral programmes and transportation to the church and graveside.

“All of what we do here (funeral home), we have decided to give it to the family free of cost,” Delapenha stressed, declining to put a dollar value on the level of assistance his company is providing.

However, a source close to the funeral home told the Observer West that the service being provided would “normally cost anywhere between $200,000 and $250,000”.

Delapenha said in the meantime, that his company took the decision to offer a helping hand so as “to relieve the family of the financial burden, as well as some of the stress they have been undergoing”.

“For us (staff members) we find that the hardest cases to deal with are those of children; they are usually very touching and so when we were made aware of the tragedy that the family is facing we could only imagine the pain and suffering from such a tragic event, so not wanting to add any financial burden and more stress to them, we decided to do the funeral free of cost,” he explained.

He said his funeral home, which commenced business in Montego Bay in 1992, has had a long history of “trying to help out in tragic instances”.

“I can recall that in the 1990s there was a major tragedy where five children lost their lives in a car accident in St James, and we did all of those funerals free, just to ease some of the burden on the family,” he explained.

Just over two years ago, the funeral home also underwrote the costs associated with the funerals for the nine-year-old twins, Brandon and Brayden Jones, who died after they were swept away by angry flood waters in the North Gully, St James.

The twins’ battered and bruised bodies were fished from the harbour near Dump Up Beach.

Meanwhile, the funeral service for Leashay will be held on Thursday June 16 at the Bible Way Apostolic Church in Flower Hill, starting at 1:00pm.

Interment will be in the family plot at Flower Hill.