(Clockwise, from top left) Claudia Kirschhoch; Keith Clarke; Bob Marley; the mystery plane at Rocky Point; Jim Brown; Bob Woolmer; Dathan Henry; and the Gleaner report on the Eventide Home fire.
October 28, 2021
10 ‘unsolved’ Jamaican mysteries
The recent trail of tragedy which began with the human sacrifices at the Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries in Montego Bay, St James last week has been cause for heightened speculation and unanswered questions about mysterious incidents including the bizarre accident which claimed the life of disgraced pastor Kevin Smith and police constable Orlando Irons on Monday.
Smith’s death has been clouded in controversy and mystery as was his time at the head of the Pentecostal church. Reports have emerged that Smith seemed to have his congregants under a hypnotic spell and controlled them to a point where they made him the beneficiary to their insurance policies and pension benefits and even committed murder and shot at the police at his behest.
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The answers to those questions remain a mystery.
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OBSERVER ONLINE compiles some of the most shocking ones.
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1. The death of Ken Jones
Kenneth Jones was a prominent member of the ruling Jamaica Labour Party administration in the 1960s and it is rumoured that he was tipped to take over the reins of the top job from then Prime Minister Alexander Bustamante. But it was not to be. While attending a Cabinet retreat at a hotel in Montego Bay, St James, Jones fell from a balcony. His death was ruled to be as a result of him sleepwalking but many Jamaicans threw cold water on the official explanation and held true to the theory that he was pushed to his death. The answers to the skeptics’ doubts have never been forthcoming. Jones was the minister of Communications and Works at the time of his death.
2. Lester Lloyd Coke (Jim Brown) dies in jailhouse fire
Lester Lloyd Coke, popularly known as ‘Jim Brown, was a leading political enforcer for the Jamaica Labour Party in the 1970s and 1980s and rose to be the head of the feared Shower Posse which wreaked havoc across the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. Coke, like his son Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke, was earmarked for extradition by the US government and was subsequently arrested and detained in 1992 at the General Penitentiary (now the Tower Street Adult Correctional Facility) until his date for extradition arrived. That day never came as Coke was burnt to death in his cell in the prison. The cause of the fire was deemed as electrical due to a television set Coke was allowed to have in his cell. However many Jamaicans believed that Coke was the victim of arson and that he was killed to silence him before he could spill his guts to the US authorities.
3. Bob Woolmer
Even though a commission of inquiry ruled that no one was criminally responsible for the death of English cricketer turned coach Bob Woolmer at the 2007 Cricket World Cup, his death remains a mystery after a pathologist ruled that Woolmer died from asphyxiation due to strangulation. He was found dead in the bathroom of his hotel room following his team’s devastating first round loss to Ireland. It was initially reported that he had died of a heart attack. An inquiry into his death ended inconclusively with a jury returning an open verdict after hearing testimony from more than 50 people. Was Woolmer murdered or did he die of natural causes?
4. Poisoned policeman.
The 2012 poisoning death of Senior Superintendent of Police Dathan Henry remains a mystery. A Coroner’s Court ruled that Henry – who was the head of the troubled Clarendon Police Division at the time -was systematically poisoned by rat insecticide but to this day there has been no one found criminally responsible for his demise. In addition a probe has not uncovered how he was poisoned. Who poisoned the senior cop?
5. Who shot Bob Marley?
Minutes before 9:00 pm on December 3, 1976, seven gunmen invaded the 56 Hope Road home of reggae legend Bob Marley and launched an attack. Marley was grazed in the chest and shot in the arm, while his wife Rita was shot in the head, his manager Don Taylor was shot in the legs and torso and Wailers band member Louis Griffiths was shot in the torso. No one died. The shooting took place two days before The Smile Jamaica Concert planned by Marley to promote peace in the politically war torn Jamaica. The attack on Marley was widely believed to be politically motivated. It has been alleged that Lester Lloyd ‘Jim Brown’ Coke was one of the gunmen but to date no one has been brought to book for the attack that nearly robbed the world of the reggae icon.
6. Eventide Home
The burning of the Eventide Home in May 1980 which resulted in the deaths of 146 elderly women, many of them blind and disabled, remains a mystery to this day. At the site of that tragic incident now stands a community known as Torrington Park which in itself has seen its fair share of brutal murders. The cause of the fire was officially deemed as arson and left a terrible stain on Jamaica’s history. The victims of the fire were all asleep when the decrepit wooden building was torched. But why was it burnt? No one has the answer and to date no one has been charged for that terrible tragedy which saw the bodies of the 146 women being buried in 26 wooden caskets at the National Heroes Park in Kingston.
7. Why was Keith Clarke killed?
Accountant Keith Clarke met his demise after members of the security forces bombarded their way into his East Kirkland Heights home on May 27, 2010 during a frenzied search for now incarcerated Tivoli Gardens strongman, Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke. Clarke was shot 21 times in full view of his family. Three members of the Jamaica Defence Force have been put on trial for his death but the reason why he was killed is still up in the air. Was it a case of mistaken identity? Were the soldiers shot at as they entered? Was his death ordered because of the belief that he was Coke’s accountant? The mystery remains unsolved.
8. Mystery plane at Rocky Point
The bizarre aircraft crash in Rocky Point, Clarendon in February is shrouded in mystery. It is widely believed that the plane which was deregistered in Mexico was loaded with illegal drugs. However after police investigators scoured the plane and the surrounding area no contraband was found and the probe into the crash was ended. The police said no crime was detected and no one was reported to them. But where did the pilot and any other occupants, if any, disappear? Mystery unsolved again.
9. Where is Claudia Kirschhoch?
To this day the disappearance of US travel writer, Claudia Kirschhoch remains a mystery. In May 2000 Kirschhoch and her colleague Tania Grossinger landed in Negril on their way to Havana, Cuba but their journey to Cuba was cancelled at the last minute. Both checked into a resort in the western town and started living it up. The 29-year-old Kirschhoch made friends with bartender, Anthony Grant, who offered to take her to a local club. Grossinger had booked a return ticket to New York and agreed to meet up with Kirschhoch but soon the writer seemed to vanish in thin air. She was reportedly last seen by a lifeguard walking away from the resort where she stayed. Investigations revealed that housemaids at the hotel found that she had not slept in her room for four days. Claudia Kirschhoch has not been seen or heard from since.
10. The three-wheeled coffin and other ‘duppy’ stories
Sections of Jamaica were thrown into pandemonium in the late 1960s and 1970s when rumours abounded about a three-wheeled coffin with three John crows aboard asking for a Mr Brown. Alleged sightings of the coffin moving on its own caused mass stampedes in downtown, Kingston, Half Way Tree and other town centres across the island. However there have been no official reports of the coffin being sighted. There have also been other mysteries involving the spirit world including the experience of five members of a household in Rose Hall, St Elizabeth who claimed to have endured three months of haunting from a duppy. The householders reported that fires broke out randomly and their home was pelted with rocks from an unknown source. Three of the persons left the haunted house and went to stay with relatives in St Mary but the haunting continued until they were asked to leave by their relatives. After retreating to Rose Hall the attacks continued and never stopped until the residents claimed they all converted to Christianity. There were also reports of schools being haunted by duppies and students being overcome by trances and other strange phenomena that have yet to be explained.
