Mere hours before she was shot to death, Patricia Spinks told the “mother” at her church someone was going to kill her. “She told me ‘they going to kill me, you know’,” Mother Pastor Carol Castle told mourners at the St Joseph Spiritual Baptist Church, Longdenville, yesterday where the funeral service for Spinks and her son Jason Nero was being held. The two caskets stood at the front of a packed church. Spinks was a devoted and loved member of the church. Spinks, 52, of La Solita Road, Kelly Village, was killed in her bed last week Friday night.
Two days later, while relatives were conducting a wake for her, her son Nero was shot by someone at the front of the house. The police suspected Nero had killed his mother after she began legal proceedings to evict him from her home. The police believed a case of vigilante justice may have led to Nero’s killing. Relatives said he had a morbid fascination with the gangster lifestyle. Addressing the congregation, Castle said the Saturday after Spinks death, she asked Nero, “Jason, who killed your mother?”
She told the church: “It was not going to stay so. God answers prayers. The Sunday, I heard the news (of Nero’s death). “When her death came, his covering was removed. Even if he didn’t do it, his covering was removed. “If you are living a life of crime, the enemy overpowers you.” She said God allowed Spinks to come home so her suffering could end and Nero, if he was giving trouble, he was not be able to do so anymore. Castle further indicated the family feud did not end with Nero’s killing. She said after his murder on Sunday, people were afraid to attend his mother’s wake. She said she went the following Tuesday and at 4 am someone called her and told her boulders were being thrown on the church.
Castle said she felt afraid but continued to attend the church to conduct services. “No little bad boy will make me not do what God wants me to do,” she said. “This house belongs to God.”
Disclosing she found out who was behind the stoning of the church, she said: “When you are in Christ, you fear no one.” Urging members to go to the police if they knew their sons had guns, she added: “If we start with bad boy business here, we won’t be coming to church. Spinks and her son were later laid to rest at the Washington cemetery.
