RELATIVES of a man who was murdered by gunmen in 3 North, Greater Portmore, St Catherine are now burdened with having to shift their plans from having a joyous and festive Christmas this year to making funeral arrangements.

The deceased is 35-year-old Orane Fraser, of a Sundown Crescent address in Greater Portmore.

The Jamaica Observer understands that on Tuesday night, Fraser was painting and carrying out decorative activities inside his house in preparation for Christmas Day, when he decided to venture outside to a nearby shop. It was at this shop that gunmen decided Fraser’s fate, shocking his relatives and the community. His relatives and the residents of 3 North are said to be currently trying to figure out the puzzle of “who could seek to murder such a quiet and well-loved individual”, according to a relative of the deceased who referred to him as “Scrappy”.

“I don’t know how to explain my feeling. It is a feeling of worry. I am just left to wonder because, if men can walk come inna your scene and walk up to you in a crowd of people and go specifically to you and shoot you up and run off just as you stepped out of your yard, that looks a way. When him get shot up and dead, people a seh dem nuh know him as that person for somebody to walk up and do something like that. They are wondering if he had an issue with someone and didn’t tell his friends. He didn’t have any children of his own, but he has four stepchildren. He is close to three of them,” the resident shared, noting that he was concerned about the mother of the deceased.

He added that the mother of the deceased now has to cancel the big celebration she had planned for Christmas. According to the relatives, dinner is still planned, but activities will be drastically scaled down.

“She called her son and asked him to collect a ham for her. She was planning a big family thing for Christmas with everybody. She even told her son to get a suit of clothes for her so she could surprise her spouse for Christmas,” the relative shared.

Meanwhile, the spouse of the deceased was emotional while speaking to the Observer.

“The feeling is terrible. You can hear it in my voice. I don’t sleep throughout the night when it happened. I was at home washing out some curtain. My daughter-in-law came in and said something went on over the shop. We were here and she ran out and came back and said it was him. I locked off the washing machine and I started to scream out and got nervous. It is bad. He was well-loved. He was a nice and quiet person who didn’t talk much. Oh gosh!”

In the meantime, Senior Superintendent of Police in charge of St Catherine South Christopher Phillips confirmed that a murder took place Tuesday night but said he was unable to provide details at this time.