A Coroner’s Court jury has found that Raheem Tyrike Barrett, a 27-year-old Jamaican national who drowned in George Town Harbour in October last year, committed suicide.
During the hearing on Monday, 4 March, the court heard that Barrett did not know how to swim.
His body was recovered from the harbour late on the night of Saturday, 21 Oct., after security staff at the Port Authority called 9-1-1 to report that they believed there was a person in distress in the water.
Police and other emergency services had been called to the harbourside around 11:30pm that night. The Port Authority staff had said they had heard a sound in the water which sounded like there was a person there, but could not see anyone.
When the Fire Service and the police helicopter illuminated the dark water, the man’s submerged body was located and brought to shore, at about 11:39pm, the court heard.
Pathologist Dr. Shravana Jyoti, delivering his autopsy findings at Coroner’s Court on Monday said the cause of death was “recent sea water drowning”.
He found fluid in Barrett’s lungs, but no signs of “trauma or violence”. He said no recreational drugs or alcohol were found in Barrett’s bloodstream, though a post-mortem toxicology report did find he had consumed some cough-suppressant medication.
Jyoti said the cold medication would not have affected his actions.
Barrett, who was found wearing just a pair of red swimming shorts and briefs, had been “acting like a different person” in the two months prior to his drowning, according to his grandmother, who lived in George Town, a police officer who had spoken to her told the court.
The officer said there had been some reports in the days before his death of Barrett acting disruptively and disorderly in West Bay and George Town.
The police officer also told jurors that the man’s grandmother had informed police that her grandson could not swim.
Jurors watched CCTV footage showing Barrett quickly crossing from Cardinall Avenue and pacing back and forth on the road at around 10:53pm.
A few minutes earlier, the court heard, he had had an encounter with a security guard on Mary Street in George Town, where he had taken the guard’s keys and tried to open a car door with them. When the guard challenged him, Barrett threw the keys at him and ran away. He was not pursued any further by the security guard, the police officer said in response to a question from a juror.
Instead, the guard called the police, who were speaking to him when the 9-1-1 call came through about a distressed person in the water, the jurors heard.
Another police officer, who was at the scene when Barrett was pulled from the water, noted in her written statement to the court that he bore a strong resemblance to a man she and a colleague had spoken to in a car park in West Bay the day before. The address he had provided them was his grandmother’s home in George Town, so police contacted the man’s grandmother after recovering his body from the water.
The jurors returned a unanimous verdict of suicide.
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