It was a fatal beating for 21-year-old Shevorn “Kyle” Morris.

Morris, who lived at Tivoli Gardens, west Kingston, was reportedly attacked by men in the community on Saturday, October 22, after he was caught stealing two crates of empty alcohol bottles from a shop.

Morris was rushed to the Kingston Public Hospital where he was pronounced dead, and head of the Kingston Western police, Senior Superintendent Michael Phipps, told the Jamaica Observer that investigations are ongoing.

“Two persons were taken into custody and we’re still investigating. We have arranged a post-mortem date,” Phipps said last Tuesday.

Before that, police had named three men as persons of interest in relation to Morris’ murder, and urged the men to report to the Denham Town Police Station by 12:00 pm on Thursday, October 27.

Sources told the Sunday Observer that a family member had brought Morris to the men, which resulted in the deadly beating. Police revealed that similar information was received, but upon being questioned, the relative denied the claims.

Dr Nagendra Babu Chandolu of Ashish Health Care, while making it clear that medical examination and investigation is necessary to explore Morris’ case, explained that it would have to be an “extremely severe” beating to cause death.

“If organs are damaged, that causes internal bleeding. If a person gets an injury or blunt hit to their vital organs like a lung, liver, kidney, brain or heart, nerve supply or blood supply can be damaged. If that is affected, the person may die in 24 hours. Sometimes they may even die within one or two hours. It depends on the severity,” Chandolu told the Sunday Observer.

Chandolu said chances of death are higher if an individual has comorbidities.

“If there’s any underlined sickness before and not able to manage the injury, then the person can die too.”

He noted that the level of damage also depends on body type. An individual with a very small body frame, he said, is likely to suffer more serious implications.

“The organs are not fully covered by any fat-like muscle, so that means because if any blunt hit, the organs are easy to be damaged or experience trauma. So there can be internal bleeding,” he said.

And a blow to the head, he explained, is more far more damaging.

“If it’s a blunt hit, bleeding can cause damage to the brain cells and those cells are responsible for controlling parts of the body including the heart. If the heart stops functioning, then you can die.”

Residents, for the most part, were tight-lipped, but two who spoke to the Sunday Observer expressed alarm at the incident.

“I cannot believe it. Only God know. If anybody know Kyle and see him body size, dem know him cyaan take nuh lick or beaten. That a wickedness!” one man said.

Another lamented: “Weh the love gone in Tivoli? It shows that life has no value because man a kill yute ova bottle. Mi nah sehh di yute dem fi guh thief, but the beating nuh match di crime.”

Meanwhile, attorney-at-law Kemar Setal advised against individuals turning to area leaders or thugs for violent punishment, as they can land afoul of the law.

“A beating is actually an offence; an assault occasioning actual bodily harm. Also, if a person is beaten and ends up dying, there can be a manslaughter charge, and person who took the individual to these people to be beaten, they would be seen as an accessory before and after the fact, to the offence or offences committed,” Setal explained.

Setal noted that if the involved parties argued that they never had the intention for the person beaten to die, it wouldn’t be considered murder, but manslaughter.

He added: “If the person contributed to the beating and so forth, he would be an accomplice. If the person did not participate in the beating but was there while the men were beating the victim, they can still be considered an accomplice. That would be what you call joint enterprise because they did nothing to show that they were not part of it.”

RISE Life Management Services is a non-governmental organisation with the focus of its programmes designed to meet the needs of young people at risk in Jamaica, particularly those living in inner-city communities.

Programmes Manager Shawn McGregor told the Sunday Observer that he is not surprised about the incident.

“…Albeit for a simple issue. Usually we hear things about rape and major theft and so on, and the don would call you and break your foot. But for a simple issue like some bottles, it is not the norm. It is an outlier in a sense,” he said.

He pointed to a similar incident in Parade Gardens back in 2005.

“I have a friend who was beaten and killed because of something he may have done — an innocent young man who plays football and was walking the straight and narrow. He may have said something out of line and they [thugs] would’ve sent somebody and beat him and he got a head concussion and he’s dead. Those were the days of the one don in the area, and now you have about three different factions, and then you have factions within factions.”

McGregor noted, however, that the practice of thugs beating young men in communities is not as prevalent as it once was.

“About 10 or so years ago when you had the likes of Dudus and other dons, and a more systematic approach, that would’ve been the order of the day. But now, what we have in the innercity is really sporadic in terms of the formation of gangs and in one community you may have five or six gangs in a small space.

“Maybe Tivoli still has maintained their structure and so that is why that can happen to a young man in that way. In Parade Gardens where I’m at now, there’s no system like that anymore. And what that has given way to is a lot of young men taking up responsibilities on their heads in a sense; on almost every lane in the communities, you have a different don.”

McGregor said there is a lot of deference to the leaders of these systems.

“Even a mother would defer to the don out of fear to begin with. But it’s not as centralised as before. The absence of it would be a great solution, but the breaking down of one system which has led to another system where you basically have kids in control with guns, holding people t ransom, which has replaced the old system. I can’t say this is working in any shape or form,” he told the Sunday Observer.