Two men lost their lives and a third is lucky to have escaped a merciless gunman. At around 1:45 on Sunday morning, the police responded to calls from the George Street area where they found two dead men, Clive Flowers and Nehru Smith, and a third, Dennis Belgrave suffering from a gunshot to the calf. as Alfonso Noble found out the three were shot at the same time in a bizarre convergence of fates:
Alfonso Noble Reporting
Blood stains and bullet holes remain at the corner of George and church street where on Sunday night three men were shot, two of them fatally. At around 1:45 on that morning a man on bicycle chased Nehru Smith and 48 year old Clive Flowers, firing shots at them. 24 year old Dennis Belgrave was caught in the crossfire and shot to the left calf. When the gunman caught up to Smith he was shot in the head and died almost instantly. Flowers was shot in the chest, he also died on the very spot where he fell. Flowers' friend Percival Blancaneux was the last to see him alive.
Percival Blancaneux - Flowers’ friend
“At around 1:30 going on 2 he decided he would go home to get more money because he had run out of money. He came downstairs and was trying to borrow a bicycle from a guy downstairs right. They guy said he could not lend him the bike because the chain was not working on the bike. So he started walking towards George Street. At that time I came back in the house. When I came back in the house I heard about 7 gunshots.”
Lancelot Vernon – Flowers’ brother
“One guy came around from West Street riding on bicycle so he said they start running. My brother and the other guy start running and they shot the other guy in the head first then they say my brother was telling him not to shoot the guy and he just picked up the gun and shot my brother in his chest.”
Percival Blancaneux
“When I open my window and looked, I tell the barber, a guy who comes here to cut my hair, to go out there and see what happened. So he went and said one man is down so, he said Nehru is down. So he looked around and said, no, two guys are down. That’s when I came downstairs. When I walked downstairs and came I saw my friend laying down on the sidewalk with a shot wound in his chest.”
Now both Flowers' brother and friend say that the shooting was definitely uncalled for as he was just looking out for Smith.
Percival Blancaneux
“I think the reason he got shot was because he saw who killed the other guy. Because the guy that got shot was talking to him. That’s how he got shot because he saw the murderer. I’m sorry he got shot because he’s not the kind of guy to get into stuff like that. I know he’s a guy who likes to party and have fun with women. He doesn’t get involved with no violence and stuff like that. So when he got shot I was really, really surprised. When it got out and saw him on the ground I was telling him, you should have stayed upstairs with me. When I saw him down there I wish he was upstairs with me because we were having fun. He was upstairs with a girl and decided to go to get more money. He was killed for no reason at all. Well for the reason that he saw who killed the other guy. He walked straight into a bullet.”
Lancelot Vernon
“My brother is a cook guy, I mean he smokes his little cocaine and stuff but they don’t have to kill him like that you know. They don’t have no reason themselves because he was trying to protect the other guy and tell the other guy that he don’t need to shot the other guy right. So the other guy said, they use it like he is a witness so the shot him and killed him. That is sad, I feel sad about it because that’s my brother you know and nobody would like for their brother to go down like that man. It kind of hurt me deep down in my heart, it hurt, I’m hurt right now because my brother died just like that. If he died for a cause then it’s different but die just like that, to see another black man just pull up on him and shot him like a piece of rag doll. That’s not fair. One thing I know whosoever killed him, if we could find out they are going to pay the price too. Because that ain’t right man, for real you know.”
And in a city where justice is served up in the streets, that is no idle threat. Reporting for Seven News Alfonso Noble.
Police have detained one man pending the result of their investigations.