Since Jason Johnson’s shooting death on Sunday night outside his Bronze Road home there has been one question tormenting his family members: “Why him?”
Lori Livingston, Johnson’s sister-in-law, and her husband, his younger brother Ushane Johnson, told the Cayman Compass in a telephone interview on Wednesday night that they are still struggling to find answers in the wake of the 36-year-old man’s death.
“Nobody had a problem with him. He wasn’t a problem to anybody,” Livingston said.
She said the family is still trying to come to terms with Johnson’s killing and make sense of what happened that night.
“What was really going on that somebody innocent,” Livingston sobbed, “someone innocent paid with his life? It was not like he was out in a bar or out creating havoc. He was in his yard, a place where you supposed be at peace, comfortable … and you die?”
Johnson, a Jamaican national, was shot and killed around 8:30pm in what is suspected to be a case of mistaken identity.
The construction worker, originally from St. Thomas, Jamaica, was pronounced dead at the George Town Hospital.
The father of two girls, 11 and 16, has been described as a hard worker who was just trying to take care of his family back home.
‘Very caring person’
“He did not deserve this,” Livingston said, her husband adding he loved his brother.
He was too distraught to speak further, only saying he last saw his brother earlier on Sunday.
“Jason was a very, very caring person, I would say. He always made sure everyone was okay … I can recall seeing him at work he was that leader, a take-care-of-everyone kind of person,” Livingston said.
She said he was never one to go out to a club, that “he was more reserved and at home. He had his small circle.”
Livingston said she believes Johnson’s death was a case of mistaken identity as he was not involved in any trouble and would always go from “work to home”.
“The farthest he went was Popeye’s on Eastern Avenue on his bike … he did not drive, anywhere he went he was with his brother. He would take him,” she said.
An unexpected call
Livingston said Ushane was the first to get the call about Johnson.
She said a person who was at the scene called her husband and told him “there had been an incident and shots were fired on Bronze Road”,
At that time, she said, they had no clue Johnson had even been injured.
She said Ushane rushed down to his brother’s house only to be told Jason was hurt.
“Only when he got there, he realised it was [Johnson who was shot]. I guess whoever was there said to him it was his brother and he had been taken to the hospital,” she said.
Livingston said she joined her husband at the hospital which is where she learned that her brother-in-law had died.
“We were only told that shots were fired. It was not until I actually got there and I pulled it out of [Ushane] that he had actually been shot and had passed away. At that moment, I was just lost … he treated me like a brother [would],” she said.
Her husband, she said, was devastated by the sudden death of his elder brother.
“They were really close, they are a close family,” she said, adding that the brothers were planning to return to Jamaica later this month to join their youngest sibling to mark the one-year death anniversary of their mother.
Livingston said Johnson was working hard to take care of his family and it was heartbreaking that his life had to end in such a brutal way.
She said Johnson’s boss was stunned when he learned of the killing: “He said Jason was his best worker and he was a great loss.”
Police have yet to make an arrest in Johnson’s killing.
‘Senseless’
Livingston appealed for witnesses to come forward with information on what happened the night Johnson was killed.
“We would want every and anybody to come forward because it’s [an] innocent [man]. It was a senseless crime and someone innocent, someone’s father, someone’s son, his life was taken way, way, way too early. It was a senseless situation,” she said.
She said the family is still waiting for further details on Johnson’s death.
A post mortem has yet to be performed to determine the cause of death and how many times he was wounded.
Livingston said the family is planning to have Johnson returned to Jamaica where he will be laid to rest.
Anyone with information about the circumstances that led to Johnson’s death is asked to call 911 or contact the RCIPS Major Incident Room at 649-2930.
Anonymous tips can also be sent directly to the RCIPS via the confidential tip line at 949-7777 or via the RCIPS website.
Tips can also be submitted anonymously via the Cayman Crime Stoppers website or by downloading the Cayman Crime Stoppers app.
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