The Jamaica Star :: News :: Lost birds return home after boy's suicide

Romario Royes - Contributed

Two days after Romario Royes hung himself because two of his pigeons escaped, the birds returned.

But, the 12-year-old boy was not around to see his beloved birds.

Romario's 10-year-old brother, Baggio, told THE STAR that the birds came back on Sunday, two days after his brother's suicide.

"Di bird dem come back yessiday (Sunday). Nobody neva try get dem or anyting dem jus come back," he said.

However, while Baggio was informing the newsteam of the birds' return, Hazel Beckford, Romario's grandmother recalled the final moments in the boy's life.

"Grandma yuh kno seh summady go roun deh go mess wid de pigeon dem and two get weh!" Beckford said these were the last words that Romario said to her before he committed suicide. He hung himself after his attempts to recapture his prized birds failed.

"After he told me that, I said 'alright mi son, is your little cousin was playing with them but don't kill him'," Mrs Beckford said, sniffing as she spoke with tears welling up in her eyes. She told THE STAR that Romario, 12, a former Kensington Primary School student, who was set to attend Waterford High School come September, did everything he could to recapture the pigeons but was unsuccessful.

Trap

"He ran an' got some rice out the kitchen and he threw it on the ground, leading back to the coop because he was trying to lead them back inside there," she said. "When that didn't work he made a little trap with a box, a stick and a piece of rope, sprinkling rice under the box, but that still didn't get the birds.

He even went as far as going on the roof trying to catch them." She continued: "I miss him - as little as he was, I lost a big thing."

Romario's mother, Sidoney Beckford, said she still has not come to grips with the reality of the tragic episode, nor have her other children, a 10-year-old boy and a three-year-old girl who keeps asking for her brother.

Sidoney said Romario was a jovial and loving child with a soft spot for sports and pets of all sorts. She recounted times gone by when he would go as far as bathing the pups of a family member's dog that lives in the family yard at Lakes Pen, St Catherine.

The distraught mother said her son was almost inseparable from his birds, especially the two that flew away. They were 'top notch' pigeons valued at $500.

Sidoney said one of Romario's six-year-old cousin was playing with the birds on the day of the incident when they escaped from the cage. Another cousin then ran and told Romario, who dashed to his grandmother's house, next door where the coop was, but could not manage to repossess his pets. He then went to the back of his mother's house where he hung himself with a piece of blue rope on a Noni tree.

Incidentally, it was the same cousin, who was playing with the birds when they escaped, who discovered Romario's body.