HURLOCK, St James — Relatives of a six-month-old girl in the usually quiet community of Hurlock on the outskirts of Montego Bay can only imagine what the last 36 hours had been like for her.

The child’s grandmother, Deedrian O’Connor, found her in her crib on Monday, roasting with fever. A few steps away, throat slashed, was the already decomposing body of the child’s mother, 20-year-old Christie McBean.

The last time relatives and friends had heard from McBean was just before 10:00 pm on Saturday. That timeline, coupled with the condition of her body, has led to the theory that she was killed that night.

Calls to the call centre worker’s phone went unanswered all day Sunday, so before setting off for work her mother went in search of her about 6:30 am on Monday.

O’Connor was too shaken to speak so her other daughter, Chrisa McBean, told the Jamaica Observer about the moment their lives changed forever.

“Because… she a call her and nah get her, she mussi knock the door and when she look at the side she see seh the bolt nuh go through. She hold on pon the top and draw it till it open up and when she look, a she she see lie down with the pool of blood up here so,” she said, pointing to her throat.

Her sister’s nose, she added, was bloodied, as was a pillow in the room.

“The child was in the crib a roast wid fever, a six-month-old baby. The nanny who usually take care of the baby when she gone a work, she carry the baby go doctor,” she added.

The child received medical care, was fed, and appears to be doing well considering the circumstances.

As Chrisa McBean struggled to make sense of her sister’s death, it became clear that grief is an emotion that is all too familiar for the family.

“Mi father just dead five years ago — them murder him and she was there; she probably woulda dead from them time deh. Five year come ketch up on her, she dead in the next five years. I don’t know how to tell you how I feel,” she said.

Chrisa McBean’s grandmother, Marcia Miller, had no problem expressing herself. She had harsh words for anyone responsible for Christie McBean’s death.

“Mi know seh the Bible speak about these last days with critical times hard to deal with and that men’s heart will be desperately wicked. But to see a mother with a baby that cyaan help himself and you kill har and lef’ the baby and the dead body in there, it’s beyond inhumane,” she said.

“Mi know seh things happen to people and you hear it but to come and be in it, it’s more than you can think about,” she lamented, her voice thick with grief.

She is grateful, though, that the baby was found alive.

“If [O’Connor] never go in there go find her this morning, one woulda decompose and one just dead,” she said.

Relatives said they burnt most of McBean’s belongings on Monday, their solution to the bloody scene in the bedroom and the flies it attracted. They also said the police were seeking a man who was seen with the now-dead mother on Saturday.

When contacted early Monday afternoon, commander of the St James Police Division, Senior Superintendent Vernon Ellis would only say “investigators are tidying up some things in relation to the situation”.

People’s National Party (PNP) councillor candidate for the Spring Mount Division, Jodian Colomathi said she is hoping the perpetrators will be found.

“The act is gruesome, it’s cruel, and I pray that these hoodlums are brought to justice… I pray that they either turn themselves in or they are brought to justice,” she said.

“When I got the call this morning I was like, ‘No, that is not possible!’ And when I started getting messages and I‘m like, ‘Okay, this is true.’ Hurlock, we’ve always been a united community. Everyone is from the area, we all know each other from the area so to see this gruesome murder of a 20-year-old with a child is horrible!” she added.