Resident threatened to call police on mother

The pregnant woman, who was charged last Wednesday with murdering her three-year-old son, had been warned by a resident of South Rivers.

Joel “Margan” Horne told SEARCHLIGHT that earlier on the day that LJ Keran Jack died, he had threatened to report Diana Caine, the boy’s mother, to the police.

Horne told SEARCHLIGHT that at about 9:30 a.m. on August 24, he was next door to Caine’s home, spraying some bush with gramoxone, when he heard LJ crying.

He said the boy’s wails upset him so much, he called out: “Dian, why you beating the child like that?”

According to Horne, Diana leaned out the window of the house and angrily said that the boy was passing stool all over the house and she had to clean it.

As he wiped the tears from his eyes, Horne continued, “I tell she if I get ah phone, me ah call police.”

Horne said after their exchange, Diana, who, in addition to LJ, is the mother of a six-year-old and a one-year-old, and is pregnant with another, moved away from the window, after which he heard the child cry out again.

“I left to go do some work by a woman up the road; ‘bout after four when me come back, me hear de pickney dead,” Horne said.

The postmortem examination revealed that LJ died as a result of blunt trauma to his head.

Horne recalled interactions with the child on numerous occasions and said he has been unable to sleep.

“Tanty, me bawl anuh; me nah sleep, me feel it.”

On August 26, Leran Jack, father of LJ, told SEARCHLIGHT that LJ resides with him at Park Hill, but the boy had spent the last two weeks with his mother at her home at South Rivers.

He claimed to have taken ‘road work’ with the Government to buy school supplies to send his son to pre-school. 

Leran said he planned to collect LJ when he returned from town last Thursday evening.

“I reach home about after 4, 5 o’clock; that’s when me ex call and say LJ dead.”

Other residents of South Rivers and Park Hill told SEARCHLIGHT they would miss the child very much. One resident said, “He was a very friendly and active child and I know his grandmother will feel it.”

When Caine, 23 appeared at the Kingstown Magistrate’s Court on August 30, she was not allowed to enter a plea, as the charge was laid indictably. She has been remanded in custody and her case was transferred to the Serious Offences Court and adjourned to September 4.