A four-day quarrel over milk ended with a mother of four hospitalized after she was doused with gasoline and set on fire by her partner of five years.
Latoya James, 25, of ‘B’ Field, Sophia, is nursing first and second degree burns at the Georgetown Public Hospital.
The woman told this newspaper that she lived with her two youngest children, five-month-old Ezekiel Simpson and five-year-old Kelly-Ann Simpson and their father, who she said was in his 40s. Her other two children—aged six and eight years old—she added, live with her mother. They were fathered by another man who she has been separated from for several years.
James explained that on September 17, she received a bag of milk from a friend for her baby, which infuriated her partner.
“He come home the Monday afternoon and ask who give me the milk for baby. I turn and tell he one of my friend and he turn and say is a man. I say man, is not a man; is a big lady send the milk with a lil child,” she recalled.
She said the man continued to question her sincerity as the days went by and when he returned home from work on Wednesday afternoon, a member of their church attempted to speak to him about the issue. “The girl from the church went and talk to him and he tell her he don’t want to hear anything. She told him leave Toya alone,” she relayed.
On Thursday, she said, he returned home, still angry about the milk, and fuelled his temper at the children. “He come home and push the baby into me and start cussing how he don’t want no children near he. The baby head jam he mouth and he get up in a passion and throw gasoline pon me on the bed and light a match,” she stated.
James said that as the mattress was engulfed by the flames, she managed to run out the door and alert neighbours. While some assisted in rushing the burnt woman to the hospital, other rushed into the home to escort the children out.
“Two boys run in the house and he run and jump over the back fence and get away… Nobody don’t know weh he deh now,” she added. The children, she said, are now with her mother.
When asked whether the matter was reported to the police, James said her family has agreed to wait until she has fully recovered before going to the authorities.
According to James, she has always been abused by this man but when asked why she remained in the relationship, she only gazed into her palm. “He is always abuse me. He used to beat me with big wood, pot spoon, every lil thing he used to beat me with,” she said. James claimed that she had reported these beatings to the police on more than one occasion but no action was ever taken by the lawmen. “I report him more than one time but the police never come… I went to court with his nephew one time because he nephew cuff me to my mouth and seh I thief something,” she recalled.
Asked again why she remained in a relationship with her abuser, James said that she does not work and the man supported the family.
When asked about his job, she explained that he is employed at the Ministry of Public Works specifically to weed grass.
James said though that this was her breaking point and she will not continue the relationship. “I ain’t going back with him. I going with my mom and my children. Don’t leh he come near me. Wha he do me I would do he back. I get brothers; I get sisters; I get cousins who could do he back everything he do me,” she added.
