THE vicious murder of 26-year-old market vendor Nicole Heron, who was stripped, decapitated, and dumped in a septic tank in 2012 by her lover, plunged her family into a vortex of trauma that, they say, has been made almost endless by her father who, since being diagnosed with dementia, calls her sole sister Nicole every time he sees her.

“My mother passed away from the trauma and my father has developed dementia; every time he sees me, he calls me Nicole, which is a constant reminder of her death. This hurts me to know that my own father does not remember me,” Heron’s sibling said in a victim impact statement read into the records of the Home Circuit Division of the Supreme Court in downtown Kingston last Thursday.

The statement was read ahead of the resentencing of former Coronation Market vendor, 61-year-old Trevor Taffe, who had originally been sentenced to life imprisonment and ordered to serve 20 years before eligibility for parole for the crime, but who mounted a successful appeal in 2022 and had his sentence and conviction quashed and a retrial ordered.

Taffe was on Thursday sentenced to 17 more years in prison at hard labour, making it so that he will spend 30 years overall behind bars for his crime.

Just ahead of the new trial in December, Taffe, through his attorney Leroy Equiano, made a surprising about-face, indicating that he wished instead to enter a guilty plea as he had, in fact, beheaded Heron and discarded her body in a septic tank at his home.

Heron’s sister, in detailing the impact of that murder on her family, said: “My sister’s death has left a scar on me and my family as well as a void which can never be filled. It has affected me emotionally, physically and financially.

“The emotional toll of Nicole’s death has been overwhelming; I feel fear, anger, anxiety, and depression. These feelings have disrupted my family life in so many ways. It has made me paranoid, unable to trust people. I am constantly afraid to go anywhere because I do not know what to expect and I think that someone is always trying to hurt me and my family,” she said.

In declaring that, “the thought of Mr Taffe being released from prison terrifies me”, the sibling said, “The stress of losing my only sister has taken a severe physical toll on me. I have developed seizures, which means I can’t be alone or go out by myself. This condition has significantly affected my independence and daily life as I am unable to work.”

She said financially, the impact “has been significant”, as her husband became the sole provider for the family.

“Before Nicole’s death I had two children; after her death I had to take responsibility for her three children — a five-month-old daughter, a seven-year-old son, and as 12-year-old daughter. When they came to live with me they had no clothes, so I had to purchase clothes for them because Mr Taffe burnt all their clothes,” the woman said, adding that her family also had to relocate from their original address because of fear.

“The way in which my sister was killed has traumatised me and my family,” the sibling said further.

On Thursday, Supreme Court judge, Justice Leighton Pusey, in handing down the new sentence, made it clear that the court, in making its decision, had weighed not only that guilty plea but also the impact a new trial would have had on the family of Heron.

“I’ve had the opportunity of reading aspects of the transcript of the original trial, because when the defence came and indicated a willingness to plead guilty I did consider whether or not this was just a, ‘This matter is taking too long, I might as well plead guilty.’ And when I read the statement from the dock by the accused in that matter, that’s when I indicated that the court could not properly sentence Mr Taffe unless he has made a full and complete indication of responsibility,” Justice Pusey said.

“I am aware of the facts — not just what I have seen from the file and the victim impact statement of just how difficult this has been for the family of the deceased — and it is in light of that, that the court is willing to proceed in this particular way so that they would not have to go through that again,” Justice Pusey told the court.

“This is a very difficult matter, a very difficult matter because of the circumstances in relation to the victim/s. Because I am not unaware of the fact that when somebody is murdered in a family like this, it is not just the person who died that is a victim but it is also the members of the family who are victims, so the court takes that into consideration,” he said.

In relation to Taffe, Justice Pusey said the court, in taking note of the plea in mitigation address by defence attorney Equiano and the social enquiry report in which Taffe took responsibility for the crime, had formed the view that “it is clear that there is total fault on his side — not just in how he disposed of the body but the continued fiction that he lived in relation to this crime”.

On Thursday Heron’s relatives, speaking briefly with the
Jamaica Observer, said they were satisfied with the fact that he will remain behind bars. They, however, were conflicted by his confession.

“Honestly, if him admission of guilt could bring her back then it would be justice, but him admitting that he did it brings up anger. I would like the same fate to reach him,” Heron’s brother-in-law said.

“He should have done it from the beginning. He bring us through the trial, and he said he didn’t do it, and then he come back again, you know? It just don’t make no sense, don’t make no sense,” Heron’s sister said.

Heron’s eldest daughter, who was present at the hearing, declined to speak, distress evident on her slender face.

According to the facts, the 26-year-old Heron on April 3, 2012 left her mother’s home to visit Taffe, her common law husband with whom she had been in a relationship for four years, at his home in Havendale, St Andrew, and did not return. On April 6 Taffe went to Heron’s mother’s place of business and said he had left her daughter at his home on April 4, while he went out, but returned to find her missing, as well as his two television sets.

Taffe, when later called by the mother and asked where Heron was, reportedly said, “Don’t worry yourself, she safe. Don’t run up yuh pressure, she soon come.” He, on the other hand, told her sister that Heron had left for “a stage show in Ocho Rios”, before telling her father that she left “with friends for Ocho Rios”.

After a missing person’s report was filed for Heron, Taffe told her sister: “Nicole alright, man. She soon pop up like peas.” When asked if she would “be in pieces”, he said, “No. She jus’ a guh pop up. Have some faith; you will soon see her, about Wednesday/Thursday.” On May, 5 2012 a burnt rubbish heap was found in Taffe’s yard containing remnants of Heron’s clothing, her bag, and hairpiece. Beneath the rubbish heap was a septic pit, and Heron’s decomposing body was found there. The body was wrapped in a comforter with the head almost completely severed, but for a piece of flesh which still held it in place. A rock was tied to one of her ankles.

On Sunday, May 6, 2012 Taffe, when accosted by the police, raised his hands and said, “Daniel God will surely deliver. Hallelujah, hallelujah.” When cautioned further he supposedly, “spoke in tongues” before telling officers, “Mi could not kill Nicole, a she look afta me and tek care a mi foot.”

On another occasion, when taken to his home by cops and a justice of the peace, Taffe admitted that the master bedroom — where traces of blood later confirmed to be Heron’s were found — had been shared by them.

A post-mortem report revealed that the cause of death was due to decapitation and multiple sharp injuries to the neck and face.

The victim impact statement from Nicole Heron’s sibling was read into the records of the Home Circuit Division of the Supreme Court in downtown Kingston last Thursday.

Vendor Trevor Taffe, 61, sentenced to 17 more years in prison at hard labour, making it so that he will spend 30 years overall behind bars for his crime.