The ill-fated Toyota Coaster bus on which a soldier was shot and killed and other passengers robbed on Tuesday night.

RIDING on one of the so-called executive buses is one of the fastest and most comfortable ways for commuters to get from the capital Kingston to the Portmore municipality.

However, commuters who boarded the blue and white air-conditioned Toyota Coaster bus in Half-Way-Tree shortly before 9:00 Tuesday night and were looking forward to a comfortable and quick ride home were in for a nightmare.

The driver, not getting a full load, stopped on Hagley Park Road in Kingston to pick up four men. The four, on entering the bus, pulled handguns and began robbing passengers of cellular phones, jewellery, money and other valuables.

But the armed bandits were apparently not satisfied and went to one of the passengers who they said looked like a policeman and began searching him for a firearm.

Police said the passenger, who they later identified as Jamaica Defence Force private Vincent Lennon, was searched by the gunmen who took his money and other valuables. They did not find a gun on him, but before they left the bus one of them turned back and ordered Lennon to stand up and put his hands up in the air. His gun was then exposed and the gunman shot him several times before taking the weapon. They then escaped on foot in the area.

It was not clear if other persons on the bus were injured.
"He must have been a Christian, because if I had my gun and the boy searched me and never find it, by the time him turn and take two step him would be history," a policeman at the Hunt's Bay station said yesterday. "He was a soldier. What did he do with his training?"

Deputy Superintendent of Police Oswald C Ayre said the Hunts Bay police were following a number of leads that could lead to the arrest of the men responsible for the robbery and killing.

Ayre told the Observer that only two weeks ago a policeman was injured when a bus was robbed under similar circumstances.

'What was I thinking?' Chris Brown speaks out

Fashion Saturday

Colourful Coif