Second taxi operator gunned down in Portmore
The police in St Catherine are probing the murder of another taxi operator who was shot and killed in Waterford in Portmore on Wednesday.
Just two hours before, another cabbie was gunned down in Cumberland in the parish.
The Corporate Communication Unit confirmed the shooting, but could not disclose the identity of the taxi operator killed in Waterford.
Egeton Newman, president of the Transport Operators Development Sustainable Services, was outraged by the latest developments.
“That would make four taxi-men shot and wounded in 14 days, two killed in one day in Portmore, one shot in a separate incident by a cop in Portmore. In all, three taxi men have been killed in eight days, who will be next?” Newman asked.
On Wednesday, in the first murder of a taxi operator in Portmore, 43-year-old Mark Perry, a resident of Gilden Way, Southboro, St Catherine was shot dead by unknown assailants in Independence City.
Reports are that Perry was at the intersection of Passage Fort Drive and Independence City about 9:15 am when armed men drove up on a motorcycle. The pillion rider got off the motorcycle and opened fire hitting the deceased. He was pronounced dead at hospital. The men escaped in the area.
Newman estimated that there have been 17 incidents of abductions, shootings and murders involving local taxi operators since the start of the year.
“There could be way more, no one is commenting on the deaths and abductions of these taxi operators. When something happens to a JUTC driver, there is a big hullabaloo about it, but when it happens to a local taxi-man or bus driver, there is a big hush-hush. Is this a psycho-social problem that is causing this indifference to the plight of taxi operators?” Newman asked.
There is a growing list of murders that is of grave concern to the transport sector.
On February 3, 2022, taxi operator 52-year-old Norman ‘Soursop’ Francis was shot and killed on Riverside Drive in Havendale, St Andrew.
On March 4, 2022, taxi driver 29-year-old Orlando Patterson, who lived in Gregory Park in Portmore in the parish, was shot and killed on Walks Road in St Catherine. The police report that explosions were heard in the vicinity of the Angels round-about at about 9:20 pm and an alarm was raised.
On March 11 2022, a taxi operator was found shot to death on the Hellshire main road in Portmore. He was later identified as 48-year-old Christopher Ellis of Old Harbour Glades, St Catherine. Ellis was found near his Toyota Probox about 8:30 p.m.
In the first week of April, a taxi operator affiliated to the Travellers Taxi Service was killed in Kingston. His identity has not been established.