A mother and her 10-year-old daughter, along with two sisters ages 12 and 17, died when tragedy struck on the Crawford to Font Hill main road, near the St Elizabeth and Westmoreland border, on Saturday.

The four were reportedly returning to St Elizabeth from a beach trip in Bluefields, Westmoreland, when the Toyota Voxy motor vehicle they were travelling in collided with a utility truck.

The police have identified the victims as Jeneen Dawkins, 30; her daughter Antwasia Glenziler, 10; their neighbours 17-year-old Jonnessa Dunkley, otherwise called Ashley, and Janneilia Dunkley, 12. The victims resided in Brighton district, Santa Cruz, St Elizabeth.

A police report said about 5:27 pm on Saturday, the Toyota Voxy, being driven by Dawkins with the three children as passengers, collided with a Freightliner M2 106 truck being driven by a Canadian utility worker.

The motor vehicles were travelling in opposite directions, according to the police, when the collision occurred.

The three injured girls and the woman were removed from the mangled vehicle and pronounced dead at hospital. The driver of the truck was not injured.

Vice chairman at the National Road Safety Council, Dr Lucien Jones, said Saturday’s “horrific news” of the collision has pushed the country’s road fatalities to 11 as of 6:00 am on Sunday — an increase of one over the corresponding period last year.

“In one single crash, we have…a terrible tragedy. One news report suggested that the driver swerved to avoid a pothole and crashed into the truck. The police report only says that the driver was in the wrong lane, so investigations will continue and we will get further details,” he told journalists via an audio release on Sunday.

Jones, who has long been advocating for safety on the nation’s roads, reflected on his call for the implementation of a safe systems approach. The safe systems approach has five categories: Safe roads; safe speeds; safe vehicles; safe road users; and post-crash care.

“The point is that just last week I was led to speak publicly about the need for safe roads in this country, and it is something that we have to get a grip on and fix quickly, but in addition to the possible unsafe roads, the police report also suggested that the driver was driving at an unsafe speed,” said Jones.

“…In addition to this, if four people died in one crash, we have [to] wonder whether or not they were unsafe road users in the sense of whether or not they were buckled up in front and back, and finally was it a safe vehicle? Did airbags deploy, and if they did, why did four people die just like that?” he said.

He reiterated his call for the effective use of the demerit point systems to suspend the driver’s licence of motorists accumulating points as stipulated in the new Road Traffic Act.

“[The year] 2026 is going to be filled with more disasters, unless we can move quickly to get the demerit point system and other aspects of the Road Traffic Act in place to ensure that we have safe speeds,” said Jones.

“We have to move quickly to have safe roads. We have to make sure that our people buckle up in the front and back of cars, and wear their helmets. We have to make sure that we have safe vehicles in this country. Our children’s lives are at stake. The lives of the adults are at stake and the country continues to suffer immeasurably because of the number of road fatalities. We have to do better than this,” he added.

A total of 374 people died in road crashes in 2025.

The scene at the quadruple fatal crash site on Saturday.

Crash victims Jeneen Dawkins, 30 and her 10-year-old daughter Antwasia Glenziler.

Sisters From right: crash victims Jonnessa Dunkley, 17, otherwise called Ashley; and her sister Janneilia Dunkley, 12.