As police question a man in connection with the country’s latest murder, the victim’s family is calling for justice for what it believes was a senseless act.
According to police, Raymon Thompson, 29, of Market Street was shot to death after getting into an altercation with a man in the area of East Street and Coconut Grove Avenue shortly before 8 p.m. Wednesday.
Police said yesterday that they were questioning a man in his early 20s in connection with the murder.
The Guardian understands that Thompson, who was a mechanic, was shot at least six times in the upper body.
His sister, Prescola McCoy, said the last time she saw her brother they spoke about her upcoming birthday.
McCoy said when she got the call on Wednesday night that her brother had been killed she was overcome with emotion.
“When I got out there my brother’s lifeless body was laid out in the road...they killed my brother like a dog,” she said.
“Why would they kill him like that and leave him like that? [Raymon] was a nice person. I wouldn’t say that everyone in life is perfect but people have to realize that he left two young children behind.”
McCoy noted that her brother was released from prison in 2010; she claimed he had changed his life.
Thompson left behind a four-year-old daughter and a six-month-old son, the family said.
McCoy said her brother was a sincere person who loved his job.
“He meant everything to me,” she said. “When I didn’t have it, he used to say ‘I [will] make it happen’.”Kendia Roberts, Thompson’s girlfriend of two years, said she was also devastated. In tears, she recounted the final hours she spent with Thompson in a hotel room. She said around 3 p.m. on Wednesday, he left her to visit a friend. It was the last timed she saw him alive. “I’m usually with him every day. Not one day I miss without him,” she said. “But this one day I didn’t go with him. “I still can’t believe it right now because every single day it hurts me because for this one single day I wasn’t with him and I know he passed. That hurts me so bad. I love him to death and I will always love him.”
The family said it does not hate Thompson’s killer, but would like to see that person brought to justice.
Founder of Families Of All Murder Victims (FOAM) Khandi Gibson said her organization will try to help Thompson’s two children and asked anyone with information about the murder to contact police.
