Hours after Cocorite quadruple murder: Man held at airport

A 29-year-old man has been held in connection with the shooting incident on Saturday night in Cocorite which left four people dead and eight others injured.

A senior police source described the man as a person of interest and confirmed he was found at the Piarco International Airport on Sunday night.

The Cocorite resident was held by officers from the Homicide Bureau of Investigations while he was waiting to board a plane to the United States.

At around 10.30 pm, police went to the airport, where they found the man with his luggage, passport and boarding pass for a flight bound for JFK International Airport, New York.

Police also searched his home, where they reportedly found ammunition for a high-powered rifle and held a 33-year-old relative for questioning.

Both men were expected to be questioned by investigators in relation to the deaths of Jonathan Osmond, 36, Antonio Jack, 57, Shaquille Ottley, 22, and Sadiki Ottley, 31, at Phase One, Powder Magazine.

Meanwhile, relatives of the dead men maintain they were innocent and unjustly killed.

Speaking with the media at the Forensic Science Centre in St James, relatives said the men were not involved in any illegal activities.

Sadiki Ottley’s mother Anne Marie Pierre collapsed in the car park of the Forensic Science Centre after identifying her son’s body.

She said her son’s death would have hurt less if he had been a criminal.

“If he was bad and if he was killing people and robbing people and they (killed him), I would have cried, as a mother, but it would not hurt as much because I know he took lives too.”

She added Ottley and his friends liming there was not out of the ordinary.

“Every weekend is that is what they do. They lime and they will sit down, they will play cards, they will cook. That is what they do.

"They not in any crime. They will take out music and play. They ent robbing nobody. Everybody that they shoot there is innocent children, innocent men, innocent people just liming and just having a little fun.”

She said she was left speechless when she heard the news, as it was the last thing she expected to hear about her son.

“I couldn't believe when I got that call. I get stupid. It ent easy, nah.”

Pierre said she never thought she would have to deal with “something like this.

“I never, never know is so it does feel. I hear mothers cry already until it reach in front my door. It dread. Is a dread thing.

“Enough is enough. I’m tired and fed up. I didn’t know it would have come to me so.”

She said Ottley, whose nickname, “Boye,” was given to him by an aunt who lives in Tobago, will be sorely missed by friends and relatives.

“He have friends not even eating because they can't believe that. We getting calls from England and Jamaica about (his death).”

Pierre said while she is dealing with the pain of losing her youngest child, her granddaughter is also struggling after losing her father.

“He has a little daughter. She is seven. Every minute, she is crying because she and her father are close.”

Another victim’s relative shared similar sentiments.

The mother of Shaquille Ottley (no relation to Sadiki) was adamant her son was not a criminal.

She said if he had been, that could at least explain his death but that is not the case.

“If my son was a gunman, I could have understood it. I would have said, ‘You shooting people, so you live by the gun, you die by the gun.’ But he was nothing like that. So how am I supposed to take this?”

She said the men who were shot were accustomed to liming there often, particularly on weekends.

“The fellas just go there to lime. They were just liming in the neighbourhood. That was a normal thing for them every weekend. Sometimes during the week and all. That is not a block, and them fellas is not no badman.”

She said she had an idea something like this might happen, but ignored the signs.

“I got a dream, but I didn’t believe it.”

Jonathan Osmond’s widow described him as “a normal person” and a “good fella.”

Radha Baljo, who had been with Osmond for several years, said he was a hard-working man who sold juice and worked in a garden to make ends meet.

“He don't do nothing. He is absolutely not a bad boy. He’s not a criminal boy. He don't do nobody nothing.

“Every one of them was good. When he came home from work, he was there with them. That was just normal. They are not any gunman or anything.”

Baljo broke into tears as she said Osmond’s death means she is now alone, as she is currently battling with the Children’s Authority to get her child back. She said now that Osmond has died, she has no one to help her get back her child, who is the only link she has to him.

“The child is with Children’s Authority because I have nowhere to put him. I trying, but is me and me alone fighting it right now to get the child back out. And that is all the piece of Jonathan Osmond I have.”

Commissioner of Police Erla Harewood-Christopher visited the community on Sunday and promised police resources would be allocated to the investigation and catching the perpetrators.

Asked if her words brought any comfort, Baljo was too distressed to speak, but a friend comforting her said Christopher’s visit brought a sense of strength.

“It make we feel strong. With her words of comfort, we felt strong, and I know I will get that (justice), but it’s just a timing. Everything has a timing and a process.”

Parents of both Ottley men, however, felt less confident in Christopher’s promises.

Shaquille Ottley’s mother said, “What the police go do? It’s every day (gunmen) are shooting people. I don't know what would be the outcome, but people dying every day.”

When asked what more she thought could be done, she shook her head and said that was the police’s job to figure out.

Pierre said she believes the crime situation will get only worse.

“The police can’t do anything. It doesn’t matter what they do, because if (the criminals) don't know God, it will always happen. All them young fellas out there, you see what they are doing? They don't know God.”

Another of Sadiki Ottley’s relatives said crime in Trinidad and Tobago is linked to corruption in the police service, and until that is fixed, crime will continue unabated.

“If you go and make a report to the police, it coming back to the gangsters and they coming and kill you. So it's a dangerous world we live in with these people right now.

"When they get out of the bobol thing, we will have a better country.”