HUSBAND GUNS DOWN WIFEBy Laurel Williams Saturday, August 29 2009
A man shot and killed his common-law wife as she sat with her lover in a car at St John’s Trace, Claxton Bay late last evening. The woman’s lover in a daring bid to save her and himself drove into the compound of the St Margaret’s Police Station, a street away.
He ran into the station and told police officers that the woman had been shot twice in her head by her common-law-husband. But by the time, the officers ran out to the man’s Nissan Almera car the woman was already dead in the front passenger seat.
Blood trickled over the front passenger door through which the 31-year-old woman’s estranged common-law husband shot her.
Severely short-staffed, no unit was able to leave the St Margaret’s station to go in search of the woman’s killer as they had to wait for back up from neighbouring stations in San Fernando, Gasparillo and Marabella.
Back up units arrived at the St Margaret’s station shortly before 7 pm, nearly an hour after the woman was shot at St John’s Trace. It took her lover minutes to drive into the station which is on the Southern Main Road. Even though there was a delay in their search for the killer, a team went out but the man was not found. Investigators were confident of an arrest, however, as the woman’s lover gave them a description of the man.
Her first name, Ornella, is the only identification investigators gave the media.
As night fell, the station became a crime scene as the police cordoned off the compound with caution tape and used scoreboards and cardboard to block off the Almera car as the woman’s body was removed and placed in a body bag.
Crime scene investigators were forced to use flashlights as the driver of the car had parked in a spot that was poorly lit. They examined the woman’s body, took photographs and searched for bullets. One investigator stood on his kit to get a better view of the inside of the car. Residents who live on St John’s Trace and the Southern Main Road ran out to witness what was taking place at the station. A few onlookers tried to climb the fencing of the station to get a glimpse of the woman and they were warned off by the police.
“I heard two loud noises and when I watch out I see a car going up the road. I didn’t know nothing about what happened until I reach up here (at the station),” said one man who lives at St John’s Trace.
Another man said he understood the woman’s lover lived at Plaisance Park in Claxton Bay as he had seen him driving in the area on several occasions.
“This is a real sad thing. She so young,” said another person, who believed the woman did not live at St John’s Trace.
Sources said the woman and her lover may have seen her estranged husband at the side of the road and they stopped. The man then drew a gun and easily shot her in the head as the front passenger window was down. One theory is that the man had hired a private investigator as he suspected his wife of having an affair.
Gasparillo police had to escort the undertakers out of the compound as the woman’s body was taken to the Forensic Science Centre in St James but it was uncertain if an autopsy would be done this morning, or over the long Independence Day weekend.
The murder recalled the shooting death of Camille Daniel who bravely drove into the West End Police Station after being carjacked on June 24 this year. Daniel was shot dead on the compound of the station.
