Bullets miss baby as parents shot dead in St James

Instead of preparing for the christening of his granddaughter on Sunday, a St James man is in mourning after his son and his son's common-law wife were gunned down in the same house as their infant child.

Relatives said Korey Clarke and Samantha Patrick, both 30, were at their Aboud Circular, Dundonald Hill, St James, home at around 12.30 am when two gunmen stormed the house, shooting them both several times.

During the attack, Clarke and Patrick used their bodies to shield their seven-month-old daughter from gunfire.

Clarke's father Anthony, who lives nearby, heard the gunshots and, on checking moments after the shooting stopped, found the baby crying near to her mother and father.

Police and a district medical officer went to the scene and declared the couple dead at 2 am on Thursday.

Speaking with Newsday at his Aboud Circular church on Thursday morning, Clarke said while he was grieving the murders, he thanked God his granddaughter survived the attack.

"They covered the baby, that's why the gunmen didn't get her.

"My thoughts are to give God thanks and say ‘Thank you Lord.’

"It could have been three of them I had to bury, and when I heard my granddaughter cry when I reach outside I pulled her out expecting to see bullet holes but I didn't see any. Thank God it was only blood from her mother and father's bodies."

He said the timing of the murders were eerie as Patrick told her husband that she dreamed about their murders on Wednesday.

"Samantha is a God-fearing person. She dreamed and told him yesterday that she dreamed that people came to kill him and her.

"When you hear Samantha Patrick dream something, look out."

Clarke said he got a call shortly before the shooting from a neighbour who had seen the gunmen walking around his son's home.

He said the murders have shaken the family and the community as his son was well-known by residents.

Clarke said his son operated a parlour in the neighbourhood and sometimes received Unemployment Relief Programme (URP) contracts for construction projects.

Clarke, the pastor of Mt St Jude's Spiritual Baptist Church, said he believes envy and jealousy were the motives behind the double murder.

Saying while he is still in pain over the murders of his son and daughter-in-law, he is prepared to forgive their killers.

"When I read my Bible, it's a tedious time now. And for the youths and them, they are ignorant about what they are doing. They don't even understand what they're doing.

"I pray to God that some part of them could change sometime, and it's only God who can forgive them.

"I hope God changes them before it's too late."

Clarke said the couple were preparing for the christening of their daughter and began cleaning the house and planning the meals for Sunday, earlier this week.

Newsday also spoke to Patrick's mother Racquel Patrick at the Forensic Science Centre, St James. She said the couple were inseparable.

She said while the murders were upsetting to the family, they intended to go ahead with the baby's christening and warned that God would ensure justice was done.

"Those fellas (killers) are heartless.

"These young fellas have guns and they feel they are powerful.

"We are still christening the baby on Sunday. They can't kill our spirit because I know there is a God above and they (the killers) are going to get their judgment just now.

"The same way we are shedding our tears, their parents have to shed their tears too.

"She wasn't a bottle-fed baby, she fed from her mother's breast and now they took away that from her."

Patrick said she remembered her daughter as a happy, easy-going woman who enjoyed eating.

She said she was proud of her daughter's relationship with Clarke.

Contacted for comment, Western Division police said while the baby was not harmed in the attack, the incident was unsettling for them.

"The killers didn't harm the child. And while we're happy that she escaped unharmed, it is, nonetheless, a very troubling situation.

"Right now the atmosphere on the part of the police is to come back strong and supress this spate of murders in the Western Division and, by extension, the rest of the country. So we do intend to come back with a strong response."

As of Thursday afternoon, no one has been arrested for the murders.

Police from the St James CID and the Homicide Bureau of Investigation Region I are continuing enquiries.