Petit Bordel man dies after being stabbed in neck

Rum may have played a part in the demise of Edward “Llowly” Lavia.

The Petit Bordel man, 39, was stabbed in his neck with a broken bottle last Friday, February 28, around 5 p.m., by another villager. He died on his way to the nearby Chateaubelair Health Clinic.

A villager, on the condition of anonymity, said Lavia and the man accused of killing him were always arguing with each other. The woman said that on the day of Lavia’s death both men were arguing when the accused threw rum in Lavia’s face.

Lavia is said to have pushed the man, causing him to fall, breaking a bottle he was holding in his hand. The man is said to have retrieved piece of the broken bottle, pursued Lavia into a nearby yard and stabbed him in his neck.

“If I tell him to do anything, he would do it and he would ask for rum. He nah deserve that death,” Lavia’s long-time friend Tutana “Lil” Turtin told SEARCHLIGHT on Monday.

She explained that Lavia was a humble and helpful person when he was sober but when he was intoxicated, he would act out and get in altercations with other villagers.

“He love singing and beating pan and he would make up songs. I feel really bad what happen to him,” Turtin said while adding that she strongly feels that had she been at home during what became Lavia’s final altercation, he would be alive.

“If I was home that would not have happen because he would have been by me. He is the kind of person don’t matter what he got into he would make it up. He always use to say he with me and he love me and whenever he go to the mountain and come back, he would always bring yams for me,” Turtin said.

Another resident Valmay Edwards said Lavia was like her son.

“He only been miserable, like talk and thing when he drink he rum, but different to that you coulda lead um, send um anyway but just as he have in he water, have in he rum, he would dey ah sing. He little interfering, but not to the extent to say he deserve that death dey,” said Edwards.

Edward, like a few other villagers, thinks that the drinking of alcohol played a big part in Lavia’s death.

“Is a real good man. If he come here right now and he not have in he rum you would not know he was there,” said Edwards who added that someone once threw hot water on Lavia while he was chopped in another incident.

James “Meddybang” Francois has been charged for Lavia’s killing, the third violent death here for 2020.