There is still more grief to go around after the Sunday night hit and run of a cyclist by an allegedly drunk Police Inspector Cardinal Smith just outside Belmopan.
Tonight we are learning more about his young victim Jamile Sheppard who had just celebrated his 17th birthday. The story is sadder because it turns out Jamile was born into tragedy as his mother died during labor and he also later lost his birth father. He wasn't an orphan for long though as the Sheppard family took him in. One of the women who raised Jamile was his adoptive grandmother Iris Board who today shared her emotions over the lost of the boy she helped to raise.
Iris Board, Victim's Adoptive Grandmother
"It was shocking to me because I helped to raise him. I sent him to school and all of that and so I never expected something like that to happen to him. It was really shocking to me and up to now I still don't feel good. It makes me feel nervous and like that. But when things like this happen you got to accept it."
Q: I can imagine how tragic and unexpected it was for you; for your grandson to die in this way especially since it was allegedly caused by a police officer who might have been driving under the influence.
Iris Board,
"And I don't like the way the police officer acted too because he didn't seem like a person who knows the law. The way he acted was like he was just a drunkard and wasn't thinking."
Natalie Sheppard, Victim's Adoptive Sister
"We just want justice so that everything goes right because my brother got a real cold death. A real cold death. He was broken up, his whole entire body and stuff was broken up. They just need to investigate this so we can get satisfaction."
It's of note that Smith was related to Sheppard although not by blood. He is the cousin of Jamile's adoptive mother. Making the grieving harder for the family is that there is a feud over his body. Though his adoptive family who legally adopted him wants the right to bury him next to his mother, his surviving relatives reportedly have different plans.