Thirty eight year old Gilbert Jackson, a farmer in Steadfast Village received five massive chop wounds that sent him to the hospital on the 28th of December in last year.
It was a domestic dispute that now has the farmer almost crippled with one of his legs requiring surgery. Today, Jackson told us that it all started because he has been separated from his common-law wife for almost three years but he wanted to raise his three sons, something that the boys' mother opposes:
Gilbert Jackson, Chopping Victim
"Family dispute and the young man just chance me because I don't support that they abuse my children between he and my ex-wife and his stepdaughter. This happens 28th December at Salada news site. I was going to buy a pack of chicken cuts and a tin of milk for my aunt and the young man approach me with a machete and he chop up the bicycle wheel to the rim and then he came and chop me up."
Andrea Polanco
"So what all chop wounds you sustain?"
Gilbert Jackson, Chopping Victim
"I got chop on my hand, I got chop across my feet, I got chop across my face, i got chop in my back and I got chop on my leg underneath here. When I got chop up went to the doctor and as I reach to the doctor I went straight to the emergency and when I came out of the coma, they had already stitch me up because I never did see the cuts, but they had already stitch me up and everything so I was in the hospital for 3 - 4 days."
Andrea Polanco
"What other follow up medical procedures you have to do now?"
Gilbert Jackson, Chopping Victim
"Well on the third I have to go back to take another operations for them to fix the bone on my hand because the bone on my hand is chop, one of them chop completely and the other one got about 2-3 inches chop. Then the foot, I can't raise up the foot by myself it drop down so they will operate on that too and fix the veins and different things. The chop on my jaw - I can barely open my mouth because the bone was chop in the jaw too."
Andrea Polanco
"Did he say why?"
Gilbert Jackson, Chopping Victim
"He didn't say why but I know why because the reason why is that they don't want me around the house any at all for me to see my boys."
Andrea Polanco
"You want your children and she doesn't want to give them to you?"
Gilbert Jackson, Chopping Victim
"Yes ma'am, I want my boys but she doesn't want to give me my boys. She don't want to give me them but she still doesn't want to raise them the right way."
Late this evening we spoke to Dangriga Police and they told us that they've been looking for the man believed to have inflicted the chop wounds but so far have been unable to locate him. The police said that while investigations continue, it has been slow because they do not have a full name for the individual who allegedly inflicted the wounds.
