A tranquil afternoon in Merricks, St Philip, was shattered by a burst of gunfire on Wednesday, leaving a 25-year-old man hospitalized and a community grappling with fear and frustration. The incident, occurring near Bayleys Primary School at approximately 2:25 p.m., has exposed deepening concerns about public safety and social decay in this Barbadian parish.
According to official police reports, the violence erupted when a vehicle approached a group socializing outside a local business establishment. An occupant from the vehicle discharged multiple rounds before speeding away from the scene. Eyewitness accounts provided to Barbados TODAY indicate the same assailants, described as masked men, subsequently traveled to the River Land area where additional shots were fired, allegedly injuring more victims.
Local residents described the scene with visceral horror. One man, interrupted while preparing his lunch, recounted the terrifying moments: ‘A fella got shot in his hand and the other in some other part of his body. He was hollering real loud. It was really loud, a heavy gun too, about 20 shots.’ The victim required emergency medical attention, with first responders taking measures to treat what appeared to be an air embolism in the wound.
The shooting marks the second such incident in the community within three months, ending what elderly residents describe as decades of peaceful coexistence. An 89-year-old lifelong resident expressed her disbelief: ‘I was eating soup. I live here all my life and I never see a thing like that.’ Her daughter, living elsewhere, immediately called to check on her safety, highlighting how news of the violence spread rapidly through concerned family networks.
Community members are now speaking out about what they perceive as a dangerous cultural shift. One male resident voiced his disgust at the normalization of violence: ‘This thing cruel, man. When a man could be hollering so hard, he in the ambulance, and you hear him hollering.’ He criticized the culture of idleness among young men, stating, ‘Get work. Work never does anybody anything. When you always liming on the block, what you expect going to happen? Gunshots have no direction.’
The concerned neighbor drew troubling comparisons to Jamaica’s gang violence, suggesting Barbados is mirroring negative regional trends: ‘We going on like Jamaica, they practicing to be like Jamaica… a lot of turf wars does be going on. Barbados too small for that.’ As a father of two, he issued an urgent plea for government intervention to ‘clear out blocks across the country,’ describing the situation as ‘out of hand.’
Parents also came under scrutiny for what community members perceive as inadequate supervision. ‘The children leave home on a morning and come out on a block to smoke. You don’t befriend your children, you need to be stern,’ one resident admonished, emphasizing the importance of instilling discipline and work ethic in youth.
The aftermath has transformed the typically vibrant neighborhood into what residents describe as a ‘ghost town,’ with the usual sounds of music and socializing replaced by an uneasy silence. In River Land, where the shooting continued, residents maintained a wall of silence when approached for information, reflecting widespread fears about retaliation.
One woman who was at work during the incident proposed establishing an anonymous hotline separate from police channels, noting that residents are too frightened to speak openly. While grateful her family remained unharmed, she joined growing calls for concrete solutions to address what many now describe as a crisis threatening the very fabric of their community.