Samuels

"An encounter with death," is how Pastor Glen Samuels described his experience staring down the barrel of a semi-automatic pistol while returning home to West Gate Hills in Montego Bay about 7:30 one evening.

Samuels, president of the West Jamaica Conference of Seventh-day Adventist Churches, related at a Gleaner Editors' Forum his gut-wrenching, yet, heart-warming experience of coming face to face with a gunman, whose life he was able to transform. The forum was held in response to the upsurge in crime in the western section of the island during the latter part of last year.

International Maroons defend Cockpit

As the debate over mining in the Cockpit Country continues, the Council of Overseas Maroons has thrown its support behind its local counterparts and environmentalists in the fight to preserve the area from bauxite exploitation.

LOC boss distances group from Kingston mess

Robert Bryan the head of the Local Organising Committee (LOC) for Cricket World Cup (CWC) 2007 has distanced his organisation from the deplorable state of Kingston, just two months before the event, and has suggested some government agencies are failing to live up to their end of the bargain.

Church needs to do more in inner cities

Following the murders of about 40 persons since the start of the year, at least one church leader has suggested that, instead of continuous prayers, the Church needs to move into garrison communities and target dons and other individuals.

"This (the number of murders) is preposterous and it will take more than praying (to solve the crime problem)," said Pastor Carla Dunbar of the Buff Bay Church of God of Prophecy in St. Thomas. "It is time that, as a church, we seek and meet and have dialogue with men in garrison communities."

Christian legal group wants sanctions against fondling

The advocacy group, Lawyers' Christian Fellowship, is calling for legal sanctions against fondling, and what it characterises as inappropriate touching, acts which are short of incest, as defined, which might be committed by one family member against another in the home.

Gun plot for Portmore

Portmore Mayor George Lee says he has uncovered a plot by a powerful Spanish Town gang to facilitate the movement of a large stock of illegal guns into one of the underdeveloped communities in the Sunshine City.

Sabina fallout

The three-month-long excavation and sewerage main installation work on South Camp Road, Kingston, in preparation for ICC Cricket World Cup matches at Sabina Park this March, has left a severe dent in the earnings of several nearby companies.