FLANKER, St James —Joslyn James’ dreams of seeing her 18-year-old son Omar Warren commencing a bartending course with the HEART/NSTA Trust on Monday were dashed after he was among two people cut down by the bullets of marauding gunmen at a shop here Thursday night.

In fact, the distressed mother who said she constantly encouraged Warren — affectionately called Brandon — to “go back to school”, recounted that it was only Thursday he ensured her of his intention to buy the shirts and pants and “get a trim” in preparation to start the course on Monday.

Warren and 34-year-old Bobby Campbell were shot dead, and two other community members shot and injured when gunmen opened fire on them.

“… Is mi last baby… and him don’t live no life yet. Him nuh trouble nobody. Him don’t smoke, nothing at all him don’t do. Him don’t in no crowd, no war,” the grieving mother told reporters.

“Me and him inna ‘war’ at all times when mi don’t see him making no movement and mi want him to go to school. When me come, him deh sleep, sleep. Me seh ‘Wash your clothes, tidy the place, and then you can go sleep,’ ” said the mother. “He is always home, unless him go practise down a ball ground — nowhere else. Mi don’t even think him know Montego Bay good. Him don’t go anywhere,” she stressed.

The police report that shortly after 10:00 pm a group of individuals were at a shop on Codac Drive in Flanker when they were approached by men armed with handguns who fired shots at them.

Four men were injured and taken to Cornwall Regional Hospital, where Campbell and Warren were pronounced dead and the two others admitted for treatment.

“When mi hear the shot dem a fire di first thing mi ask is ‘Where is Brandon?’ Dem seh him inna the house. When me go round, is Brandon mi see lie down pon him face and me seh, ‘Brandon,’ and him move him head one time and put it down back. Mi don’t hear nothing else from him,” a tearful James said.

When our news team visited the home of Pauline Simpson, Campbell’s grief-stricken mother, she said she had a premonition of her son’s death. In fact, she related that the last time they spoke she warned him to be careful.

“Yesterday [Thursday] morning on the step mi seh, ‘Bobby, you need to watch you walking and… who you talk to a road; check yourself,’ a seh. A di last thing mi seh to him inna the morning. He asked, ‘What you mean bout me walking?’ Mi seh, ‘You need to know because a you a do the talking and the walking.’ Dat mi seh to him,” she lamented.

She added: “Mi think everybody liked him because he is easy to like. Him a party-going person; anything in the community, he is there. That’s the person he is.”

Overcome with fear, one female community member was overheard planning to “run away”.

“Is a long time now wi don’t hear anything like this in the community. Mi start tremble when mi hear the whole heap a shot,” an elderly man said.

A dejected Councillor Charles Sinclair (Jamaica Labour Party, Montego Bay North Eastern), who visited the bereaved families in the community, expressed his disappointment over the attack, which he said has disturbed the peace the community has been enjoying lately.

“What happened last [Thursday] night is just a very backward step. I will continue supporting the community, supporting the families, and to ensure that peace is restored, while working with all the stakeholders,” Sinclair assured.