An Argyle woman says that doctors told her today (Friday) that her son is paralysed from the chest down after police allegedly ran him over, reportedly during a vehicular chase on Wednesday.
“The doctor just told me that he is paralysed from the chest down. His left leg is broken and his spine is broken,” Natasha Weekes told iWitness News of her 18-year-old son, Cjea Weekes.
“He said [that after the accident] they (police officer) threw him in the [police] vehicle and when they threw him in, he was telling them he was feeling pain,” the mother told iWitness News, recounting what her son had told her.
“Even when they brought him to the hospital, the way they took him out of the vehicle, people thought that he was dead. The workers who were there asked what had happened to him. All they told the workers was that he had gotten into an accident and they (police officer) left.”
She said that her son’s speech is deteriorating and one had to put one’s ears close to his mouth to hear what he is saying.
However, Commissioner of Police Colin John, told iWitness News that the report reaching him is that the youth was injured when he fell, shortly after he ignored a police signal to stop while riding a motorcycle dangerously.
“I don’t know about being chased. The information I received from the police is that he was riding the motorcycle in a dangerous manner, the police came out of the vehicle, they gave him the number one stop signal, he refused to stop. He drove past. Based on the information, the bike actually hit a police officer on his hand. He fell from the bike and broke his leg. The police took him to the Milton Cato Memorial Hospital. The matter is being investigated currently.”
The police chief said he was not sure where exactly the incident took place nor was he aware that the mother had said that the motorcyclist is paralysed from the chest down.
“I don’t know about that. I can seek an update. Yesterday when it was reported to me, they said he had a broken leg. I don’t know of him being paralysed,” John said.
Weekes, who works at The Prime Minister’s Residence, found out about her son’s injuries when a friend told her that a nurse had called saying that Cjea was at the Accident and Emergency Department of MCMH.
When Weekes visited the hospital, Cjae “was there lying with a lot of bruises on his body,” she said.
“They said his foot is broken. He told me he can’t move his head, he can’t move his back. He was just there stiff, but he could talk. He was vomiting. He told me, ‘They wilfully.’ That’s what he was telling me — that police ran him over; that they wilfully because he told them he has licenced for the bike.”
The mother said that her son’s has a learner’s permit, which allows him to ride the motorcycle, which is licensed and insured, and was making the trip with another motorcyclist, one “Dusty”, of Georgetown, who was riding a separate motorcycle.
“I had the permit. And he said that the friend did not have a permit on him either so he didn’t want to stop for the police to harass them, because, you know, sometimes police can just thing you and do what they have to — beat you up or whatever, so he said they didn’t stop.”
Weekes said that while her son did not have the permit on his person, he had an “L”, indicating that he was a learner, affixed to the motorbike.
“Dusty was there but he didn’t know that they run over Cjea,” Weekes said, adding that Dusty visited her son twice in hospital.
“He only saw like when Cjae fell … because he was running away from the police.”
Weekes said her son told her that he went to Questelles to buy a motorcycle tyre, but it was the wrong tyre. He and a friend went to carry back the tyre, and Cjea was riding his motorcycle with the tyre around his neck.
She said that in Questelles “like when they (the police) start chase them, one of them give him one lash in his chest, like in the travelling vehicle that they in, and like he keep hustling with his bike until he reach up in a dirt road in Vermont and then that is when they thing him with their vehicle so he fall and he end up under their vehicle and wrap up.
“And when he wrap up, he underneath there and he saying, ‘Oh God, alyo ah kill me.’ He said they stopped and they pull him out. When they pulled him out they said, ‘Leh we take him to the hospital before he die on us.”
The mother said that when they brought Cjea to the hospital, there were no police officers with him and the hospital staff inquired about this.
“I talked to certain people and maybe they called the Commissioner of Police.”
Weekes said that a police officer came and inquired about her son.
She said the officer told her that he had come to transport someone to the hospital and the police in Questelles had “called to find out if the guy is here or if he died or anything like that.
“So I said, ‘How can they just say if he’s dead or anything? What happened? Are you the one who knocked him down?’”
Weekes said that the officer told her that he was not involved.
The officer then left and was relating to two workers at the hospital about what his colleagues allegedly told him, Weekes said.
Natiesia Weekes, Cjea’s sister and Natasha’s daughter, told iWitness News that she was at hospital between 7 and 8 p.m. Wednesday when the officer was relating to other people there.
“The police officer was saying that it’s long time that they are trying to catch these bike boys and he was saying that the person who was driving the police transport was chasing them and then my brother fell off. He was saying that they cut into a dirt road to chase them and he was saying, ‘Them man ain’t know that the road has a dead end.’ I’m not sure if he was talking about my brother or the policemen who were driving.
“He said they cut into a dirt road and my brother fell off the bike and they threw him in the transportation and brought him to the hospital. And he was saying that my brother probably has a different story than the policemen.
“So I asked him, ‘Were you there?’ He said he was not there. So I said, ‘How you know how the incident happened?’ He said when the men came to the police station he heard about it
Meanwhile, Weekes said that four police officers from the Questelles Police Station came to the hospital, saying that they were looking into a report by other officers about the incident.
“They said four police officers reported a matter and said they were chasing two young men on bikes and when they chased them my son got into an accident.
“I asked them if that was all. He told me yes. I asked him if there was nothing more to that, he told me no and that is the matter that was reported.”
Weekes said that the officer asked to speak to her son and she told them he could not do so at the moment because he was in a lot of pain.
The mother said that the officers told her that her son’s motorcycle was at the police garage and it was in good condition – “nothing happened to the bike, it started and everything.”
She said that the officer spoke to the doctor, but no one from the police force had come since then to check up on her son.
Woman, try seek medical help elsewhere for your son. You know and heard of all the ill-stories of the MCHC.
If you are financially strained, set up a Go Fund Me Page for him. Last but no least, take everything to the Lord in prayer.
All your son should have done was to cooperate with the police. It is too late now.
I pray that the Lord grant him strength in all his pain and have mercy on him.
I hope for a Miraculous Recovery.
Those police officers in saint Vincent is cunno men, they really have some fools fools joining the force. They really need better training where chasing in once boys to get their daily quota up that they made a catch for the day. Foolish.
Liars
There is a video by a bystander and the lies will be revealed
Young people today are some of the most foolish I have ever encountered…instead of stopping and paying a small fine, you prefer to make a huge scene now you’re paralyzed? Make it make sense please…even if the police beat you after they stopped you, wouldn’t it be better than what he’s experiencing now, and his mom would have advocated for him differently…for all the youths reading this, please learn from this unfortunate situation….you big and you supposed to have sense…
COP hiding something
What the f*** does do the police bay miss I want u to fight for your son right and don’t back down I feeling your pain
How can we as Vincentians get justice when it come to police…when would the police in this country be held accountable for their actions??
Why run from the police if you did nothing wrong? Riding a bike with an L number plate but not haing the permit on you is like driving a car and leaving your license at home, again, wrong. Paralyzed from chest down but not breathing tubes or anything to assist breathing? Run over by car and paralyzed from chest down but have a great memory and talking? Hmmm. People, wait for the truth. Parents talk to your children.
They will say anything to protect each other because all of them in cohoots with one another. They do no wrong but god will judge them. It’s only a matter of time.
Woman get a good lawyer ,I believe they wilful and full a damn lies.
Observer
Like Seriously
Even if He didnt stop does that gave the Police RIGHT to Run the Vehicle On Him
Eh Tell Me
Come On Man
Guess U nah hav Kids
Im Sure if was yr Son u wont be sayin dem foolish Shit dey
Dragon u so Dumb wat foolish Comments so like u never leave without yr License or something one day in yr life eh smh
The Doctor Said his Spine is Broken…. is he lyin tell me?? cause he hav no tubes to help him breathe n stuff
Smh
Guess if was yr Son
U wont be talkin Trash… Dotish
@MKEI If you see the video of the incident you’ll actually regret saying that
You’re not better than the polices. While people are mourning you’re here focusing on money and making a joke out of it. You’re so heartless
And before some of you people blame young people saying they this and that and all the crop maybe you should watch the video and see what actually happen instead of believing everything u heard
Put yourself in the mother shoe. What if it was your child?
These police cant be serious ..you chasing a person down to that extent come on foolish officers u know will see him again simple..you officers create an action that was very simple to deal with.. i belive you hould pay for ur reaction none you be in that force forever..be good police
I cant believe the comments on this article insinuating that him not stopping for an officer means what they did to him was an equal counter measure. You are 100% wrong. The law requires punishment equal to a defense. This officer(s) should be charged for assault and negligable homocide. If this were an older or perhaps wealthy member of the community, this would have never happened.
Furthermore, he was not taken care of like he had the right to, as well as deserved. No one even listened to this CHILD and its heartbreaking. Is this really how you treat youths? He was let down by every system and everyone in it. Its deplorable.
This person who calls himself a lawyer, is a lawyer who cannot spell.
The police in SVG is corrupt. Gonsalves will never lose cause the system is rigged. SVG will remain backward and poor as long as we cover our eyes and pretend we can’t see. It will take a revolution to make a solution. how much more can people take? Lord
Let us see the video then.
Even though the youth was wrong for not stopping, that does not give the police the right to hit him with the car. Like WTF, police need to be charged. And what kind of training these police have? U hit the child then pick him up, throw him in the car and drop him off at the hospital without an explanation. This most likely made the injuries worse. This is so f@#ked up.
Vengeance is Mine say the Lord, I will repay. Ar yo dying days will tell on ar yo, these wicked things done to others will be haunting and. tormenting us for our lives. Will not. go away tha easily, and what excape us will not pass ar yo off spring.. Ever wonder why some people children usually be like they are?
Can I have the link to the video
“Dre” clearly you were on the scene, so you could speak from an eye witness point of view…no one knows the circumstances surrounding how the young man received his injuries other than those on scene, I’m just speaking based on the information the COP briefed the reporter on…meanwhile everyone seems to be taking the responsibility from the young man…coming from where I’m from I’ve thought my kids from a very young age how to interact with the police…this is a skill all “black pickney” must master especially coming from where I’m from….
It’s the level of naive that comes from some people, you just know they have no clue of a context outside of this pebble called SVG, and how the big world works….if h evaded a police stop in Philadelphia, the same police would ram him off the road…simple…only in SVG do you find rhetoric like this. Its really shameful.
Dre you are being an ass fir making a statement without understanding my question. I ask if he is paralyzed from the neck down, why is there no tubes on him? Meaning, why was he not on a ventilator to help me breathe? Not that i was saying the lie. I was not there just asking questions and i stand by my statement about leaving his permit at home.