The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

A GRAND Bahama woman cannot marry the man she loves because more than a year since she found the decomposing body of her ex-husband, she is still awaiting DNA test results that would officially confirm his death.

Without the results a death certificate cannot be produced, she told The Tribune. “It’s hard because I want to do what’s right in the sight of God and get married but I can’t because I don’t have the death certificate for him,” Maria Scott, 50, said. “I don’t want to be tempted... and live in sin and all that. Why is this taking so long?”

Ms Scott and her ex-husband, Elwood Scott, 47, were separated for several years but remained in touch until she and their daughter found his decomposing body at his Glenbourne Drive home last March. 

He had battled diabetes for years, though his official cause of death is unclear.

Though Ms Scott is certain the body found was his, DNA tests must be performed to confirm the identity of deceased people whose body is found decomposing. While local DNA labs collect samples, they do not perform DNA analysis, sending samples to labs in the United States for testing. In cases like the one affecting Ms Scott, the Royal Bahamas Police Force (RBPF) spearheads the process. 

For years, government officials have talked about building a state of the art forensics facility so DNA analysis can be performed locally. 

Ms Scott’s case highlights the practical difficulties experienced by families facing lengthy delays.

She said her daughters are anxious to bury their father, whose remains are in the morgue.

“My daughter said ‘they don’t care’ about her daddy,” Ms Scott said, fighting tears. “He can’t be put to rest. Just because we weren’t together doesn’t mean he wasn’t loved. He was loved but they have him up there like a dog, like nobody cares. If that was one of their family members they would have already put him to rest. How many families in The Bahamas have to go through this?”

The Scotts were married for 24 years, but separated for the last six. 

“We were still good friends even though we went on with our lives and we had two children together,” Ms Scott said.

“I left him in the house because I didn’t want it. One day I said to my daughter, ‘When was the last time you heard from your father?’ She said about two weeks ago. I said ‘Your daddy don’t take that long to call you’ and so I carried her to his house. The music in there was up high. She knocked on the door but there was no answer. She went around to the window but then came running back to the car saying it smell bad. I went there and said, ‘oh my Lord my husband dead.’ There were flies around the window. He was diabetic and shouldn’t have lived alone. The police came and told us he had to have been dead for seven to ten days.

“I was told they had to perform a DNA test to confirm it was him and they even took blood from my daughters to compare his with their samples. It’s been over a year now I’m waiting for the DNA test results and they haven’t come yet. There is no death certificate for him so I can’t get married and he can’t get buried.”

She added: “My child need closure. I need closure. Lord why is this taking so long?”

Ms Scott said she offered to pay for the DNA test to be expedited, but was rebuffed.

Not long before The Tribune called her Monday, she said she was on a beach begging God to fix the problem.

In fact, she once hoped to get remarried on a beach in front of family and friends.

But now she said: “I would go straight to a justice

of the peace and get married. I’m not going for anything like that anymore.”

Backlog

Ms Scott’s circumstance is not unique.

She said an employee of the Rand Memorial Hospital told her another woman waited 15 months before she got the DNA results she needed. Over the years, others have complained about the lengthy wait for DNA results. 

Former State Minister for National Security Keith Bell said the absence of DNA analysis in The Bahamas is a problem that must be fixed.

It costs The Bahamas millions each year to get DNA samples tested in the US, he said, including $3,000 for every piece of evidence analysed in criminal cases.

“A major problem is our cases are not given top priority to be analysed at the labs we send them to despite all the money we pay,” he said.

“This contributes significantly to the backlog we have. We have experts, young people in this country who can do the job. We could even make money doing analysis work for private purposes or for cases coming throughout the Caribbean. It could be self-sufficient if we became more proactive.”

Mr Bell, an attorney, said it should have taken no more than three months to finish Ms Scott’s case.

“Even though the body was in a state of decomposition, they should have been able to identify him,” he said. “The issue of identification does not arise given the circumstances of him being found in his own house, in his own clothes, etc. This might have been a case that fell through the cracks and because there are so many cases the police maybe didn’t prioritise it. She should get an attorney, have the attorney write to the commissioner of police asking for the status of the file and for the file to be turned over to a coroner who could then officially declare the cause of death. The circumstances in this matter are such that they should not be relying on a DNA test to declare her husband dead.”

Attorney Wayne Munroe, however, disagreed, highlighting the case of deceased convict Eddison Thurston when explaining why DNA tests must be performed on decomposing bodies in such cases. 

“In the case of Eddison Thurston, the offence was that there was a fire and a corpse was found,” he said. “Police took the corpse to be that of Eddison Thurston because the corpse was burned in either his house or his car. They later found Eddison, the man who supposedly died in his car, alive hiding in the ceiling of his house. In questioning him, they determined he killed some random vagrant and burned him up in the car and that was the basis upon which he was convicted.

“In this case, clearly the wife didn’t see her husband every day because they were separated. If you haven’t seen someone for sufficiently long how do you know they didn’t move and someone else didn’t come into the house? A DNA test must be done.

“If I were representing someone in her position, I would question why there is such a hold-up. Is it a scientific reason? If they say it is just one case in a long line and she offered to pay, why won’t they accept payments from her to get it done? That I cannot understand. If there is no scientific reason for the delay she should be able to get a sample that was taken from the body and have it tested against their children privately. If his mother is still alive that is the better person to have it tested against but getting it done privately should be quicker.”