MANDEVILLE, Jamaica — A 27-year-old active member of the Jamaica Defence Force is on track to appear in court for the first time Wednesday, nearly a week after the brutal killing of his 29-year-old partner Tanzanya Dunkley in the quiet Three Chains community just outside Mandeville, local law enforcement has confirmed. Damanice Tyrone Williamson, the accused soldier, was formally charged with murder Saturday evening, following a confession he gave to investigators over the weekend, according to a senior police source who spoke to local media Jamaica Observer.
Court documents and police accounts detail a deadly confrontation that unfolded mid-afternoon last Friday. The conflict began when Dunkley made the decision to end her romantic relationship with Williamson, triggering a heated argument between the pair. In his confession, Williamson told detectives that an internal voice commanded him to kill Dunkley during the dispute. After he grabbed Dunkley’s mobile phone, the victim clung to him in an attempt to retrieve the device; at that point, Williamson grabbed a knife and cut her throat, law enforcement recounted.
Minutes before the fatal attack, police say, Williamson sent Dunkley’s 12-year-old daughter to an upper floor of the family home, telling the child he needed to speak privately with her mother. Immediately after carrying out the killing, he fled the property. Neighbors told the Observer they heard loud screams coming from the residence around 3 p.m., and moments later spotted a man matching Williamson’s description running from the home, his clothing stained with what looked like fresh blood.
The shocking murder has left the tight-knit Three Chains community reeling. Leonora Reid, a relative of the victim who arrived at the scene shortly after the killing, described the mood as one of collective grief. “The community is saddened and in mourning. Everybody is in mourning, because it is said that this has never happened here. And look at the people around you; everybody coming from near and far, because this is strange to people living in this area,” Reid told the Observer Friday.
The brutal killing is not an isolated incident for Manchester Parish, however. Local authorities have recorded a steady rise in domestic violence-related offenses across the region in recent years. The growing public safety crisis has led police to repeatedly call for the establishment of a dedicated, specialized intervention centre to address domestic violence in south-central Jamaica, a proposal that has yet to be fully implemented as the parish grapples with rising violent crime tied to intimate partner conflict.