Family in daze after vlogger Lexi D Bess dies in crash

Pain was etched on the faces of relatives and friends of popular YouTube vlogger Lexian Williams yesterday, hours after the 20-year-old, along with two men, perished in a road crash along a section of the North Coast Highway in Trelawny.

Williams, popularly known as 'Lexi D Bess', was being transported by 25-year-old Kenroy Smith of Hague in the parish when the Toyota Mark X motor car in which they were travelling crashed into a Toyota Voxy about 6:45 p.m. on Friday, while en route to an event dubbed Cookout Vibes being staged in the Rio Bueno square.

Smith, along with 30-year-old Chris Codner – an up-and-coming entertainer known as FreeSpeech – of Exchange in St Ann and who was driving the Toyota Voxy, also died.

A number of passengers were also hospitalised.

When The Sunday Gleaner visited Williams' home in Rio Bueno yesterday, Williams' loved ones were still in shock with black faces all around.

Her mother, Sharon Parris, paced the verandah, looking out on to the street as if expecting to see her daughter coming.

"Mi can't talk," was all she could find the strength to say to our news team.

A cousin, Anniecea Harrison, said that Williams' father, Douglas, was away in Jackson Town and was also walking around dazed.

"A mi first get di call as she dead," Harrison said, wiping away tears.

"When mi hear di news, di phone drop. Mi nuh stop cry. Mi traumatised. It nuh real," she said, describing Williams as a comedian who loved to make people laugh.

"From her primary-school days at First Hill All-Age to Albert Town High, she was the life of the party and the entertainer. She was always dancing and giving jokes," Williams' brother, Owayne Lowe, added.

He told The Sunday Gleaner that his sister had been anxiously anticipating the relaxing of COVID-19 protocols.

"The Cookout was the first thing to get her back to the activities she loved. Lexi had ambitions to become known worldwide, and she was on the way. She had her YouTube channel where she had blogs and advertised parties and other entertainment events," Lowe said.

Pulling a hoodie over his head and covering his face, the grieving brother said that he had been looking forward to seeing Williams entering various entertainment contests, in which she would usually excel.

"She, along with some friends, had just won a Jus Bus' Contest. From one night she won a talent contest put on by Charlie Chaplin right here in Rio Bueno, she never looked back. Just one forward movement."

Andrew 'Senegal Citizen' Givans, a DJ who also lives in Rio Bueno, said Williams' passing had also shaken him up.

"Mi an her always a perform. She was a leader. You go to her to discuss business. She always have a positive vibes. A nuh mi one a go miss her; hundreds a we," he said in between humming a tune.

Shopkeeper Marcia Parke said many persons were at the Cookout and Lexi was to be working in the bar.

News of the tragedy came as a shock.

"I said, 'No, sah. Is like five minutes ago she was in the bar.' The whole place was stunned. People couldn't eat their food and the music almost stopped playing," Parke said.

She described Williams as a "mannersable girl who had no enemies". She added, "You could always say, 'Lexi, give me a joke', and she would make you laugh."

More than 100 road fatalities have been recorded across the island since the start of the year.

leon.jackson@gleanerjm.com