Good Samaritan on defusing suicide attempt: I looked at him like a brother

A Petit Valley man is being hailed as a hero after he and others coaxed a patient down from the roof of the clinic block of the Port of Spain General Hospital, from which he threatened to jump yesterday.

Jelani Uri Samuel, 34, took his father to the hospital for a check-up yesterday and was waiting for him at the clinic when he heard a commotion in the car park at around midday. He said when he went to investigate, he saw someone standing on the roof of the three-storey building, threatening to jump.

Newsday spoke to Samuel after the incident and he said he felt the need to talk to the patient. He coaxed the man down from the roof after almost ten minutes of talking to him.
“All I was thinking about was God, the entire situation. I saw him (the patient) as one of my own brothers and I didn’t want anyone to have to deal with the horror of seeing him fall from that height.

“I tried to relate to him on a personal level and reassure him that regardless of whatever was going on, God was in control.
“I was confident it would turn out okay, but it was very tense for everyone.”
The man on the roof was escorted out of a media house last month when he tried to speak to a reporter about problems he had accessing medication. After Samuel and others spoke with him, the man willingly came down from the roof and was taken to a room at the clinic where he was treated by nurses under police watch.

Samuel said he was frustrated that some onlookers took out their phones and recorded the stand-off rather than helping to defuse the situation and lamented how apathetic society had become to human suffering.
He said, “I mean, you’re seeing a man’s life hanging in the balance, but you want it on video? We are losing it as a society if we continue to ignore the pain of another human being like that.”
Samuel said while he was happy the situation ended without bloodshed, he hoped that rather than being punished, Chase would receive treatment.

“I don’t think putting him in jail is going to help him. He’s in a vulnerable position and something like that might do more harm than good.”
A release issued by the North West Regional Health Authority yesterday afternoon confirmed the incident and said they would not divulge the identity of the man involved.
It is uncertain how the patient got onto the roof of the hospital.

Belmont police are investigating.