‘A WICKED ACT’

Residents of the usually quiet community of Riverside Drive in Bailleston, Clarendon, are reeling from shock and grief after the burnt and partially decomposed body of 13-year-old Shantina Sergeant was discovered by the police behind her home on Monday evening.

Sergeant, who was a student at Christiana High School, was reported missing by her father, 46-year-old Lawrence ‘Marcus’ Sergeant, last Friday.

Up to late yesterday evening, the police were still searching for Lawrence, who they believe can help with what has now become a murder investigation.

“What a wicked act!” exclaimed Clevon Messam, a farmer from the community.

“From mawning, all now mi nuh move mi cow, and not even mi tea mi nuh drink from mawning,” he said, expressing his distress at the news.

Messam, who described Shantina as a “mannerable” child, who “nah pass yuh and nuh seh hello”, said he was not aware she was missing until the police discovered her body behind the house in which she lived with her father.

He said her father moved into the rural community about three years ago and mainly kept to himself.

Shantina, a former student at Excelsior High School, went to live with him this year.

Last Wednesday, the last day Shantina was seen at school, community member Clifton Stedford recalled seeing her pass his house after classes. He said she paused for a moment, appearing as though she was hesitant or uncertain about going home.

“It look like him have a mind fi go, and like him wah draw back. Look like him mind nuh hundred fi go,” he said.

“Mi go back inna house and mi nuh see him again,” he recalled.

On Friday, he said he saw Lawrence leaving the community with a fridge on his back and inquired whether he was moving.

He said Lawrence told him he was taking the fridge into the town to have it fixed but said he had not seen him since.

Stedford said the entire community was shocked when they learnt that the teen was missing and later found dead.

SHAKEN BY NEWS

“Him (Lawrence) daughter missing and him come from dung ya, how har neighbour nuh know? Yuh nuh have no neighbour yuh tell seh yuh daughter missing? Suh mi nuh know weh him a play … . Nobody inna di community nuh know nothing,” he said.

“Dah one ya shake everybody,” he added.

Julieth Unis, Shantina’s stepmother, said she felt devastated when she heard that a body believed to be Shantina’s was found at the house she had lived in up to a year ago.

She said she was in a physically abusive relationship with Lawrence for five years before she left a year ago. However, she said they still kept in contact because of the young son that they share.

Unis, a market vendor, told The Gleaner that the last time she saw Shantina was Wednesday, on her way from school, when she passed by the Spaldings Market to play with her four-year-old brother.

She said she became concerned on Friday when she realised it was getting late and she hadn’t seen her stepdaughter.

“Mi seh to Marcus, ‘Marcus, how Shantina nuh come home yet?’ Mi seh, ‘Yuh call har?’ Him seh, ‘Yes’.

“Inna di evening mi come up from Spaldings. Him (Lawrence) call mi phone and seh mi and him fi come up a (police) station, “ she said.

Unis said she accompanied Lawrence to the Christiana Police Station last Friday night to file a missing person’s report.

“Him (Lawrence) tell mi seh him look inna him (Shantina) phone, … him see like him (Shantina) have boyfriend. And mi seh, ‘Marcus, if him have boyfriend, dat a wah? Nuh yuh daughter? You couldn’t jealous afta yuh daughter if him have boyfriend!” she recalled.

On Monday morning, Unis said she informed him that she was going over to Shantina’s school to ask students if they had seen her. She said Lawrence told her to go ahead of him.

“When mi go over di school, wah school friend tell mi seh Shantina seh him fraida him fada, and she nuh wah talk him problem wah a happen wid him and him fada.”

That same evening, she said the police informed her that they were at the house in Riverside, which was overcome with flies.

“Mi call Marcus. Mi seh, ‘Marcus, Lawd Jesus! Marcus, weh fly dung a yuh yard a do?’... Him seh him bun up wah bed,” she said.

She said moments later, she was told by police that the body believed to be Shantina’s had been found.

“Mi start bawl out,” she said. “Di police dem seh him burn up. Only bare bones left back pon him,” she said.

Up to yesterday evening, Unis said Lawrence called her, inquiring about their son.

“‘Mi love di baby.’ Only dat him a seh,” she said.

Unis said Lawrence was aware that the police are seeking him for questioning, and she encouraged him to turn himself in.

“Him seh him nah turn in himself for him nuh have nobody fi bail him, and dem something deh. Suh him look like him rather when dem shoot him and kill him,” she said.

Superintendent Carey Duncan, head of the Manchester police, told The Gleaner that the police received unconfirmed reports from community members that Shantina was being sexually molested.

“But we don’t have anything of evidential value to support that,” he said.

Duncan, in the meantime, is appealing to Lawrence to turn himself in to the police.

“We’re making the appeal to have him just come in to us so we can have a conversation. We suspect that his daughter is deceased, so we want to confirm certain things, and I believe that he is in a very good position to help us to move the investigation forward,” he said.

sashana.small@gleanerjm.com