SITTING ON a small metal chair along the dusty pathway off 72 Mountain View Avenue, St. Andrew, yesterday, Joyce Sampson wept for more than three hours. Her son Michael Tyrell, 30, was one of two men killed in execution style early Tuesday morning. The other man was identified as 20-year-old Junior Rowe.
Tyrell was shot at least 12 times. His body was found inside a one-bedroom house across from the neighbouring premises where Rowe was killed.
Denver Frater, Detective Superintendent of Police, said residents heard gunshots some time before dawn and again shortly after 8:00 a.m. The bodies of the two men were later discovered and the police alerted.
Reports are that the men's death may be linked to an M-16 rifle which was seized by the police on Monday in Black River, St. Elizabeth, following a robbery involving a police constable attached to the Special Anti-Crime Task Force.
Three men were taken into custody in connection with that seizure. Superintendent Frater pointed to a freshly dug hole at the rear of an abandoned yard from which, he said, the M-16 rifle was taken. It is alleged that the men were accused of lending out the weapon and paid the price with their lives.
Superintendent Rosie McDonald-Barker, who also visited the scene, assured that Tuesday's double murder will not shatter the fragile peace in the troubled Mountain View Avenue and adjoining communities that prevailed for more than a year.
