Fourth time deadly for Jomo “Top Dog” Brudy

The number four is considered by some to be an unlucky number and that proved true for Pole Yard, Arnos Vale resident, Jomo “Top Dog” Brudy, who died from gunshot wounds last Tuesday, April 11.

Brudy, a popular vendor who was known for selling hot dogs under the Ace gallery in Kingstown -before vending was banned in the capital and he relocated his business to Arnos Vale- was shot at around 7.30 p.m. on Monday, April 10, while sitting on a bench outside a shop he operated in Pole Yard.

Originally from Edinboro, the shopkeeper and father of three girls was ‘liming’ outside his shop located opposite his home, when a masked gunman walked through a space between Brudy’s house and a neighbour’s wooden dwelling and opened fire before disappearing using the darkness as cover.

The outspoken vendor, who was struck in his shoulder, neck, chest and abdomen among other places, died one day later at the hospital. This was the fourth time he was being shot.

John “Dan Dada” Dallaway, also of Pole Yard, but originally from Georgetown, was shot in his upper left thigh during the same incident but survived. He said he tried to run away but was struck.

SHOP THAT Brudy operated at Pole Yard

Brudy’s friend, Avon “Grins” Campbell said she is “devastated”.

“Words cannot explain how I feel,” Campbell told SEARCHLIGHT on Wednesday, adding that the reality of what happened to Brudy really struck home when she saw Dallaway return from the MCMH and Brudy did not.

“I say well, he dead for true. That is how I believe he dead because two of them go in the hospital and he alone come back,” Campbell said, while adding that she had just turned off her generator when she heard five gunshots, followed by another 13 to 14 loud explosions.

She said when she went outside she saw persons placing Brudy inside a vehicle.

“I ain’t get to see him again,” Campbell said, as she shed tears.

“We feel real bad about it. The whole community is feeling down,” Campbell said.

Another resident said the bullets woke him up and he heard when the gunman fled the scene, using the space between two homes which lead to a river in the area.

“He went up or down in the river and get way, most likely,” the man said.

At the time of his death, Brudy had been shot at three times before.

On Thursday March 3, 2022, at around 11.20 p.m., Brudy, 47-year-old Owen “Kenny” Stoddard of Paul’s Avenue, and Randolph “Bruce Lee” Samuel of Lowmans Hill were at a shop in Pole Yard when an assailant appeared at the shop door and opened fire on them.

Stoddard died from his injuries but Brudy and Samuel survived. This was the second time that Stoddard was shot. He was wounded once before- on Tuesday February 11, 2020, On December 3, 2008, Brudy was walking in Ottley Hall with a female Edinboro resident Shereen Clouden, a twin, when someone shot both of them. Clouden was shot in the back of the head and died and Brudy’s eye was damaged by what some said was a shotgun pellet.

On November 2, 2012 Atiba Bess, a 20-year-old Ottley Hall man, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for manslaughter in relation to this shooting, while another man was acquitted.

On May 8, 2009, Brudy was shot once again, this time in his scrotum. His wounding came one day after giving testimony in the preliminary inquiry into Clouden’s murder. He was outside his Edinboro home when a gunman shot him.

On Thursday, July 9, 2009, Uroy Labay Robertson of Evesham and Ottley Hall was remanded to Her Majesty’s Prison (HMP) for discharging a loaded firearm at Brudy, Alfonzo Davy and Terron Prince of Edinboro and causing actual bodily harm to Rocky Richards of Edinboro, on May 8, 2009.

On September 2, 2012 at Walvaroo, Robertson, 24 at the time, received a single gunshot to the left side of his head, which destroyed his brain, and lodged in his right cheek. He was killed less than an hour after being released from police custody.

Brudy is no stranger to the law. On May 8, 2012, after eight months in prison, he was cleared of the murder of Rilland Hill CD vendor, Shawn Gordon. Gordon was discovered face down with a gunshot wound to the left side of his head in an area known as Neverson Gap, Edinboro, at 9:15 p.m. on December 19, 2010.

Charges for Gordon’s murder were withdrawn against Brudy and Dwayne Banfield, and that left another man, Devron St John facing the murder charge. Before Brudy and Banfield were freed, they gave testimony for the prosecution.

Later, in 2012 St. John was acquitted of the murder but on July 16, 2015 sometime after 8:00 p.m. along the Richmond Hill public road, someone shot the 26-year-old Ottley Hall resident in his throat. He died on the spot.