The search for six-year-old Keyana Cumberbatch ended in despair around 3 pm yesterday, when police found the child dead in the place they least expected to find her. The child was found in her apartment at Building 4, Maloney Gardens, D’Abadie, in a barrel, beneath pieces of clothing. The find came almost a day to the week after the body of one-year-old Jacob Munroe was found in a cesspit near his Maracas, St Joseph home. An autopsy revealed he was beaten and smothered to death.
And yesterday, as stunned Maloney residents reflected on Munroe’s killing, they once again wondered how someone could be so heartless to murder an innocent child.
Speaking with members of the media shortly after the child’s body was removed from the apartment at 7.28 pm, Asst Commissioner of Police in charge of Homicide, Wayne Dick, said it was difficult to conclude that the child’s body was moved to the apartment after she was reported missing on Monday. Dick said police could not say, due to the state of decomposition of the body, whether there were marks of violence on her.
It was reported that the child, a second-year pupil of the St Barbara’s Shouter Baptist Primary School, arrived home on Monday, changed her clothes and was on her way to her grandmother’s house with her younger sister, three-year-old Briana Lewis. This was her daily routine. She stayed at their grandmother’s until their mother, Simone Williams, returned home from work every school day. Cumberbatch was last seen in company of a male relative who is still in police custody assisting officers with their investigations.
Dick said his men, called in from the three Homicide Divisions—Port-of-Spain, Arouca and San Fernando—would be working as best as they could to ensure they conduct a thorough investigation so that when charges are laid they would be airtight. He added that his men had two main focuses in mind, “there is a God and it is child’s murder they are dealing with.”
When the T&T Guardian arrived on the scene just after 4 pm, residents were chatting among themselves about the “wickedness” of “that man.” Some sat in front their apartments looking on. Cars slowed down, drivers rolled their windows down to inquire, and when informed shook their heads and drove off. While the adults murmured amongst themselves about what they would have done had Keyana been their child, five schoolgirls were singing Bible songs they learnt from each other. Only one said she knew Keyana.
With anger etched on their faces and visible in their speech, residents waited until the body was brought out. When it happened, there was a loud wail of “Oh God!” followed by loud crying. Residents, who were before then silent on their balconies and standing in the roadway outside the home, showed their anger. “Women have to know who they putting themselves with,” one woman shouted. Another woman screamed, “Bring him, he have to suffer!”
“That is wickedness! Jesus! Why people so wicked? Look the barrel the child was in,” shouted another as the clothing that covered the child’s body, the barrel she was placed in and her body were placed in waiting vehicles. Keyana’s father, Kevon Cumberbatch, who spoke to the media earlier, said the suspect who in custody must be brought to justice, adding the key to his cell should also be thrown away. “Who filling that space now?” he asked before leaving.
Dianne Vincent, a self-professed adopted grandmother of Keyana, said the child was always around her and would spend time with her sister, Vincent’s granddaughter. “Right now I have no words, all I want is justice. Look where they found the child,” Vincent said. Dick told the media that the police would maintain a presence in the community during the night.
Last Thursday, the body of Munroe, who was reported kidnapped two days earlier, was found wrapped in a purple sheet in a cesspit close to where he was allegedly snatched by three men. It was reported to the police that around 12.30 pm last Tuesday, a close male relative of Jacob’s was at his Santa Rita Trace, Maracas, St Joseph home when three armed men entered and demanded that the man hand over a gun he was hiding for someone.
After he said he had no idea what the men were talking about, the men are alleged to have ordered the relative to slit his own wrist and drink a flammable substance. The men then grabbed the child and fled the home. On Wednesday he was laid to rest.