Tweet
<span style="font-weight: bold">A migrant who vowed never to return to Jamaica after being robbed may never rest in peace after his ashes, which were transported back here to be scattered, were stolen when thieves attacked his family.</span>
President of the Returning Residents Association, Percival LaTouche, made reference to the incident while he was speaking at a function in St Catherine recently.
In an interview on Friday night, LaTouche told THE STAR that the 78-year-old Jamaican who had emigrated to England was robbed when he came to the island some years ago. After this incident, Latouche said, the man vowed never to return to the country. Before he died recently, however, he asked his family to cremate him and scatter his ashes at a specific location. His request, however, was not fulfilled as his ashes, which were being stored in an urn, have still not been located.
THE STAR was told that the family of the deceased man was held up at the entrance to their Clarendon home about five weeks ago. The thieves ransacked the house and made off with the urn, along with their passports, clothes and money. Although the daughter of the deceased made a public appeal on radio, the ashes have still not been found. Broken-hearted, she went back home to England.
Latouche said, "She made an appeal and told them to take everything else and just leave that at an address and call her. She went back to England." He said incidents like these were keeping persons away from returning to the island and said, " It's not only remittances that are drying up, but the number of returnees is drying up too. What will they steal next?", he asked.
He had also warned those at the function by saying, "I am warning you to be very careful and to let your relatives who are travelling here (Jamaica) know that they must be very careful at the airport, as oftentime there are henchmen who take off their tag and by the time they reach home, someone is at their gate to say 'hello', 'welcome'."
Latouche told THE STAR that in the last three years, more than 300 returning residents have been robbed.
<span style="font-weight: bold"> is not funny haha mek mi laff...is juss yaad irony ...ongle a yaad u cudda mek dat promise an see it come bout even wen u dead...</span>