KINGSTON, Jamaica — A frustrated Carol Blackwood Hewitt is intensifying her appeals to the hearts and good sense of Jamaicans and people overseas, to help her sister Dacia Forrester reach a US$55, 000 target that will enable her to be airlifted to a United States hospital for surgery after she was set ablaze on Thursday afternoon at a gas station in Withorn, Westmoreland, allegedly by a pump attendant.

Forrester and the pump attendant were said to have had a disagreement which led to a physical altercation and subsequently to Forrester being sprayed with gasoline and set on fire.

Blackwood Hewitt lamented that while her sister languishes in a local hospital, time is running out for her life to be saved and made a desperate appeal on Tuesday during an interview with the Observer Online for donations to come in more quickly.

“I need your help to get my sister out of the country. The air ambulance is waiting. She is dying. Please help my sister in this time of crisis. I was in touch with the Ministry of Labour and Social Security and they said they are going to support us but we haven’t received it yet. The time is slipping away. I even reached out to Miss Olivia ‘Babsy’ Grange,” she said.

The Observer Online understands that just under US$7,000 has been donated so far through a GoFundMe account which was set up to raise the air ambulance fare for Forrester.

Luke Josephs, co-founder of the Burn Foundation of Jamaica and the Crisis Support Charity, the entities which have been leading the mission to raise the funds to help Forrester, appealed to members of the public for assistance, stressing that she is a human being who is badly in need of their help.

“We are a far way from our target and the family is in need of the public’s support to save the life of Dacia. At this time, what we know is that a human being is critically injured and requires life-saving medical assistance. Severe burn injuries demand immediate, specialised care and every hour matters. Every donation counts. In moments like these, our humanitarian responsibility as an organisation is to act swiftly in the interest of preserving life,” Josephs said, indicating that while the task appears very daunting, the hope is to raise the funds in order to move Forrester out by Tuesday night.

The police have charged 30-year-old pump attendant, Collate Swaby with assault occasioning bodily harm, in connection with the incident.

There has not been much clarity on whether the police will lay additional charges in relation to the matter.

On Monday, the Constabulary Communications Network issued a statement in which it indicated that the police were preparing a file containing the names of three women to be sent to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP) for a decision to be made regarding the charges.

Up to Tuesday morning, the Observer Online was told that a sister of the Forrester who was arrested following the incident, was still in police custody. That sister is alleged to have inflicted some form of wound to the gas station attendant, and while trying to separate her from Forrester during the altercation. It was unclear who the third woman is, who could possibly face criminal charges in the matter.