Rosalie Bain, the mother of the country’s most recent homicide victim, holding photographs of three of her sons. Photos: Terrel W Carey Sr/Tribune Staff
By RICARDO WELLS
Tribune Staff Reporter
rwells@tribunemedia.net
THE pervasiveness of illegal firearms and the “kill or be killed culture” perpetuated by them are leading to the destruction of inner-city communities, a mother preparing to bury a second son in four months has said.
Rosalie Bain, the mother of the country’s most recent homicide victim, insists more needs to be done to “once and for all address the problem with guns”.
On January 1, Ms Bain’s 19-year-old son Terrance Rolle Jr was shot and killed as he was leaving the New Year’s Day Junkanoo Parade. Rolle Jr’s murder marked the country’s first for 2019. Last Friday night, his older brother Barron “Jam Dawg” Roberts, 30, ate a final meal at home before leaving to spend a few hours with some friends.
He was fatally shot in his head just hours later on Hospital Lane, becoming the country’s 23rd murder for 2019 according to this newspaper’s records. Yesterday, police said a 42-year-old man was in custody in connection with the incident.
According to their mother, both of her sons were “gunned down by the streets”.
“The only thing I find myself questioning is where in the world all these guns coming from? Guns are destroying us and no one, I mean no one, can tell us where or why these guns coming here. You have guns ripping our people apart and the powers, [people in control] aren’t saying anything about the guns.
“This my second son gone like this and I need to know now, where are these guns coming from? They have to be coming from somewhere.
“Go look at these killings… these are guns coming from somewhere unknown, blowing up the lives of people. We have to put our foot down,” she said.
Ms Bain issued a plea to residents living in inner-city communities like the one encompassing her Parker Street home - Bain and Grants Town - to do more to uplift the members of their neighbourhoods.
If the scenes of both her sons’ murders were mapped by constituency, both would have fallen under the boundaries of Bain and Grants Town.
Effectively, the two men were killed in the neighbourhood they had called home their entire lives.
“I am hoping that the children see what this is doing to them and their families. It needs to stop. It’s too much,” the distraught mother said. “Too much killings, too much violence and it seems to be stuck in the hood. I grew up [in this same community]. It was nothing like this.”
On the issue of violence in the inner-city, she added: “Now everyday it’s something else. We are getting our families destroyed and bringing about hurt after hurt. It needs to stop.
“It’s getting worse. Everyday somebody is getting hurt. You might not hear of it, but everyday someone in our neighbourhood is getting hurt. We need to bring back a love for each other. It has to stop. This community is too small. We need each other.
“This goes beyond the church and the schools… it is up to us and what we work to make better. We need love. We need understanding.
“If all of us grow up together, how can I do harm to you? We can disagree, but if I have real love for you, I can’t hurt you. This one killing that one and that one killing this one, why? It has to be a reason. We need love, man. We need understanding.”
Recalling her sons’ deaths, Ms Bain said she turned to prayer for her basic survival, telling The Tribune her grief comes and goes moment to moment.
In the lead up to Mother’s Day this Sunday, she said her eldest son had already started preparing to make the day special for her, given the earlier loss of her younger son.
“Just a couple of days ago he was sitting down with me making Mother’s Day plans to go to church and do something after that; now all of that has been wiped away, come to an end, come to a full stop,” she said.
“Me and Barron have also been close. But after the death of [TJ] we grew closer because he saw what that did to me. My boys were like my friends. They looked out for me in a way that made be happy to be their mother. Them two together, they were close and they were the ones that made it happen for our family.
“They had their little moments, but they were close.”
She continued: “I’m trying to cope. While I have other kids, on a day like that you want all there. It was already going to be tough without [TJ], but now Barron… I have to just take it one day at a time.
“Until I lay him to rest, I have to go just one day at a time.”
Neither of the two brothers left behind children.
Ms Bain said her memories of them will live on in the good they did for her and her remaining kids.
As of yesterday, Ms Bain said she was still struggling to financially recover from the cost incurred from the burial of her younger son.
She said her family will now “weather a storm” to make another funeral possible.
“We are a set of people that know how to come together now and weather this storm. It will be rough, but we will have to find a way to get this done,” Ms Bain said, sitting at her dining room table.
“God has never forsaken me, and in this circumstance, I know he will see me and my family through.”
Comments
joeblow 5 years, 6 months ago
Guns are not the problem. It is the mind that tells the hand to pick up and point the gun that is where the problem lies. Fix the human heart and these kinds of problems disappear!
DDK 5 years, 6 months ago
Easy access to illegal guns is NOT helping. Guns are a big part of the problem; they are part of the current sick mind set.
Naughtydread 5 years, 6 months ago
I'm sure her two sons were innocent boys who never meddled in any bad dealings.... good God fearing young men.
ThisIsOurs 5 years, 6 months ago
It don't matter if they were the worst ingrates to have walked the world. She's connected to them in a way only mother's could know
John 5 years, 6 months ago
Jesus also meddled, right? And that’s why he was crucified, right?
Sickened 5 years, 6 months ago
I have nothing positive to say.
ThisIsOurs 5 years, 6 months ago
That's honest :-|
bogart 5 years, 6 months ago
WHERE ARE ....IN DA ...SAD STORY....DERE ....FATHERS.....MENTIONED.....??????????....ISNT DERE SOME PASTOR....CLOSE ENOUGH ....dey been in there neighbourhood their entire lives......FAMILIAR WID THESE BROTHERS MURDERED......IN DA AREA HAVE SOMETING TO SAY....IN DA ARTICLE.?.?.........
bahamianson 5 years, 6 months ago
Nicely said , Joe Blow!
bahamianson 5 years, 6 months ago
it is all about intention. A knife can butter bread, spread cream cheese on a bagel , secure a screw in a piece of wood or be usde to stab someone. The knife is not the problem same as the gun.
John 5 years, 6 months ago
Like the two who shot up the school near Columbinejust hours ago, killing one and injuring eight. One of the shooters was an underage female. Both shooters were white. But the media showed them in black silhouette. So most viewers, even now are assuming these mass murderers are black.
ashley14 5 years, 6 months ago
I’m not. Columbine has never been black shooters. I’ve not seen that.
ashley14 5 years, 6 months ago
Colorado has too many copycats trying to receive the notoriety of the first Columbine shooting. The single parents with latch key kids turned out some sick minded adolescents. Obviously there are lots of reasons but this generation is really sick.
TalRussell 5 years, 6 months ago
Yes, yes regardless circumstances a comrade mother's grief like no other and just maybe by listening carefully words mother of 'two' murdered children, we may find a way out destroying the very fabric our beloved Colony of Islands capital, our youth - yes, no......... God save we beloved Queen!
John 5 years, 6 months ago
On a talk show yesterday they were talking about how some teens view death and suicide.. They see death as not being final but like in a video game. When your favorite character or hero gets killed, you can restart the game and give him new life.
ashley14 5 years, 6 months ago
Yes I’ve heard that too. I drive a school bus. The middle and high school students constantly play video games on their phones. Actually I once had a fight after one student loss against another student. That young man has a horrible temper and would argue with a wall. Most people don’t want to die and most of these shooters then commit suicide. They are killing other students for no reason, total disregard for human life.
geostorm 5 years, 6 months ago
My heart breaks for this mother and for the countless other mothers whose sons have placed them in such a painful predicament. Our young men need role models and mentors and NO, their mothers should not be it for them.
Yes, @joeblow, it speaks to the condition of the heart, we have some really angry young men and women walking around our society. They feel unloved and abandoned and turn to all types of illicit activities to fill the void. I dare say, if we fix the family structure, return to the way it used to be back when my grandparents grew up, we would see a radical change in the attitudes of our young men. Men need other positive male role models to teach them how to be responsible and productive!
TalRussell 5 years, 6 months ago
Telling signs Comrade John's got's sugar blood affecting he thought process - him need do a switcharoo over from them Candy Cigarettes to some fine Home bakes kinds ingredient laced Brownies, yes, no?
John 5 years, 6 months ago
Isaiah 53 New International Version (NIV)
53 Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? 2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. 3 He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. 4 Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. 6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. 7 He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth. 8 By oppression[a] and judgment he was taken away. Yet who of his generation protested? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished.[b] 9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth. 10 Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes[c] his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand. 11 After he has suffered, he will see the light of life[d] and be satisfied[e]; by his knowledge[f] my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities. 12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,[g] and he will divide the spoils with the strong,[h] because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
John 5 years, 6 months ago
Don't you know they're gonna kill your sons Don't you know they're gonna kill, kill your sons Don't you know they're gonna kill, kill your sons Until they run, run, run, run, run, run, run away
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