Second schoolboy dies tragically in summer vacation

While many youngsters his age were passing their summer holidays engaged in enjoyable activities, 15-year-old Justin Young, recognizing a huge gap in his family’s income, decided to help fill it by working on a truck which transported concrete blocks.

That decision to work, and not play, caused the Lower Questelles resident his life.

Justin, a second form student at the Bethel High School, died at the Milton Cato Memorial Hospital (MCMH) on Thursday, July 28, hours after the truck he was travelling in overturned at Choppins.{{more}}

According to Joslyn Young, Justin’s mother, on the fateful day, her son left home at about 6 a.m. to go to work, but never made it back home.

Joslyn said that around 2 p.m. on the day of the accident, she got a call telling her to come to the MCMH, because her son had been involved in an accident at around 11:30 a.m. and was in the hospital.

The mother of five said that she rushed to the hospital and on arrival was told that she could not yet see Justin, as he had gone to have a Computerized Axial Tomography (CAT) scan because he had head and other injuries.

“After the CAT scan, they said he had to go operating theatre one time, so I wait outside the theatre and after a doctor came and told me she doesn’t have anything good to tell me and I started to cry,” recalled Joslyn, while speaking to SEARCHLIGHT on Wednesday.

Joslyn said that the doctor left her and later returned, at which time the details of her son’s injuries were given to her.

“…she (the doctor) said his skull fracture and kidney mash up and he have internal bleeding and she will try her best. After the surgery, they took me to see him in Intensive Care and when I go in, it’s all about lying down alone, he can’t say nothing, can’t respond, can’t see me,” stated the bereaved mother, who revealed that after she went home, she received a call after 6 p.m. asking her to return to the hospital and when she did, the doctor told her that Justin had passed on.

“He was good child. Look at what he was doing. He know we didn’t have anything, so he went to work to make sure that we eat,” said Joslyn.

She said that up to press time, the driver of the truck, Ricky Bruce of Lowmans Leeward, had not visited her.

The bereaved mother said she was told that he had been unable to visit because he himself had received injuries to his chest when the truck overturned.

She said that the police and the other passenger in the vehicle, Jayden Job (also 15 years old) told her what had happened.

“Three persons were in the truck. He, the driver and another guy and he is the only one who get injured. He was in the middle. The driver had seatbelt and the other guy said he held on tight. A car was coming towards them and the driver went too much to the edge of the road, so the gravel that was on the truck pull over the truck and it rolled over a bank about three times before stopping,” explained Joslyn.

“I feel plenty bad because I miss him,” said Joslyn of the third of her five children, who celebrated his 15th birthday last April 16.

He will be laid to rest on Saturday, August 13, after a church service at the Apostolic Faith Church in Questelles.

Joslyn said that the truck’s owner, Chris Wilson, has agreed to pay for Justin’s funeral.

According to a police report, the truck, TQ164, owned by Chris Wilson of Campden Park and driven by Ricky Bruce of Lowmans Leeward, was involved in an accident along the Choppins public road at 11.30 a.m. on July 28.

The report says that the truck was coming from the Rabacca Dry River with sand and when it arrived in the vicinity of the Laidlow’s residence, where the road is very narrow, a car was travelling in the opposite direction and while passing the car (which had pulled aside), the left front wheel of the truck went off the road and while the driver was able to get back on to the road, the weight of the sand in the truck pulled the vehicle over an embankment.

The report also said that the truck rolled over a number of times before coming to a stop.

Justin is the second 15-year-old teenager to lose his life tragically during this summer vacation, as Giovanni ‘Jo’ Sutherland-Sam of Sandy Bay drowned in the waters off the Clare Valley Beach on Saturday, July 23 around 11 a.m. (LC)