34-year-old Marlon “MOB” John of Fairbaine Pasture was gunned down last Sunday; just 4 months shy of his 35th birthday. His death brings to 8, the total number of homicides committed thus far for 2020.
Sources saying two masked men pulled up on the scene and opened fire before fleeing sometime around 3:15 pm. According to police investigators, “the deceased was shot multiple times about his body… he was taken to the Milton Cato Memorial Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival by the District Medical Doctor.”
Lawrence John, the deceased’s father, told reporters on Tuesday that his last memory of his second to last offspring was of him leaving the house. “I was here fixing a lock and he been inside wanted to come outside but the door was locked. When I got the door open he went up the road. From the time he went the road he came back down for a bottle. He was the road all the time since he went back up, then I hear up the road – ” he imitates rapid fire gunshots.
“From the time me hear that sound me say boy something happen so I went on the step and stand up. And I saw like some people ah run,” the elder John continued.
“I saw someone waving , ah tell me come. Me say come for what? A next guy came down the road say Marlon deh up deh shot.
“Me say ‘Marlon deh up deh shot?” The father of 10 children explained that upon arriving on the scene he was greeted with the sight of his son trying “to get up in a pool of blood.” An officer phoned for back up and a Suziki driving Samaritan offered to rush Marlon to the Accident and Emergency department of the local Hospital. “Well the condition of how he bin deh you had to put a sheet or so in the vehicle. I help them put him in the vehicle.”
But that was about as much of the ordeal as the grieving single parent could have faced. He opted out of travelling to the hospital. The two shared a cordial enough relationship but Lawrence John was unable to say whether or not his son died as result of any particular motive. “Sometimes Marlon come in all hour ah night me don’t even know. Yo done know when you have children they does off and on but he was no problem to me because he’s my son he was no problem.”
The two lived together but the elder John is not yet able to say when last rites would be observed for Marlon even though the mandated autopsy was just finished. Asked if he knew how many shots took his son’s life, he responded, “They say ‘bout 15. Must be way them find. 15 shots they say.”
He described the resulting wounds and injuries, “one foot break, one hand break, he got a bullet in his face – two bullets across he face. His fingers and chest – boy is life eh.”
Whilst his father was hesitant to describe him as a troublemaker, he did acknowledge their mutual disagreements none of which gave the elder John any cause to fear violence at the hands of his child.
He was however mindful that there might have been at least some reason for his son’s senseless killing.
“25th of next month would be three years” since his mother died. “He gone go meet her ,” John further opined, a he took to mean would be reflected in death as it was in life as Marlon lived with his mother in Villa before her death 3 years ago.
Marlon was shot while in the company of another male, suspected to be the son of the groceries and liquor shop’s proprietors. Although police bulletin lists a 30 years old labourer as being “shot on the back of his left leg” the victim was not named.
Investigators are still looking into “the circumstances surrounding [the] shooting incident.