About midday on Tuesday, a gleeful Lloyd Simpson waved goodbye to his mother moments after settling a minor family dispute between relatives.
He reportedly told her that "everything was now alright" and that she "mustn't worry herself too much" in light of her hypertension. His mother, Suzan Reid, 52, went to bed feeling reassured. But her contentment was shattered when she received a disturbing phone call about 2 a.m. on Wednesday that her son was dead. Simpson, 28, was shot multiple times in the head and upper torso after thugs in Greater Portmore, St Catherine, ambushed him while he was trying to locate his cousin who lived in the area.
THE WEEKEND STAR understands that Simpson, who hails from Summerfield in Chapelton, Clarendon, was staying at his cousin's house after obtaining a plumbing contract last Saturday. He was allegedly given a lift by the contractor but disembarked at an unfamiliar entrance to the scheme. Thugs who believed he was 'straying' allegedly killed him because his answers could not satisfy them. Reid said her blood pressure rose to 176/111 when she heard the news.
"I cannot close my eyes. From I got that call, I am just in total disbelief. I lost my brother actually the same way because they broke down his house and stabbed him 19 times before shooting him in the head. I lost my husband to a gunshot also. Dem hit me, enuh, but this! This one, hit me more than anything else," she said tearfully.
"Leon (his nickname) is a loving father, he is always there for his children," she said. Simpson's cousin, who was on the phone with him during the attack, cannot stop crying.
"A me get the job fi him and mek him tek it up. But right now mi a think a better mi did mek him tan weh him deh. Mi just did wah him have something weh him can have a food inna him pocket and can feed him likkle daughter," he said. The cousin said he heard Simpson's killers say 'yah go dead tonight'.
"Him call back a minute later and say 'mi get shot, enuh', so same time me ask him weh him deh. Him say him deh pon one field beside a one gully, but yuh know how Portmore have nuff gullies so mi never know weh fi go," he said. Following a frantic search by the cousin, the contractor and police, Simpson's body was found on a field lying in a pool of blood.
"Mi see him lay down on his back with his shoes off and bag deh one side. He was dead by the time we got there," the cousin said.