A quiet Caribbean community in Barbados is reeling from senseless violence after a 26-year-old University of the West Indies law student was killed in a late-night drive-by shooting Tuesday, leaving his grieving family struggling to process their sudden, devastating loss. Daquan Roberts, a third-year law student who lived with his two uncles in Christ Church while his mother resided overseas, was caught in the barrage of gunfire on Spruce Street in Bridgetown, The City, during a family gathering to mark his grandmother’s 63rd birthday.
Speaking exclusively to local media Barbados TODAY on Wednesday, Anthony Ifill, Roberts’ great-uncle, said the entire family remained paralyzed by shock just 12 hours after the attack. Still visibly shaken by the trauma of the previous night’s events, Ifill described his great-nephew as a reserved, focused young man who dedicated most of his time to his legal studies and rarely went out socializing. “He was quiet and he didn’t go anywhere. He was studying law in school,” Ifill said, calling the young student’s untimely death “unfortunate.”
The shooting unfolded just after 10:50 p.m., when Roberts and dozens of his relatives had gathered outside the family home on Church Hill Road, Gall Hill, Christ Church, to celebrate the birthday milestone. According to preliminary law enforcement accounts, a white motor van approached the gathering from the direction of Beckwith Street, before unidentified assailants inside opened fire on the crowd in a clear drive-by attack. “It actually was a drive-by, right, it’s a drive-by,” Ifill confirmed in an interview, recalling the moment chaos erupted. “When I hear the shots, I actually run, I fall over the table.”
In the immediate panic of the attack, Roberts and his father attempted to flee to safety down a narrow gap near the home. It was only during the escape that Roberts’ father realized his son had been struck by gunfire, Ifill explained. “He and his ran… straight down the gap. But then when the father realised that he had been shot, he started screaming out,” Ifill said. “He ran from here to the end of the gap… and then he fell.”
Roberts was rushed by private car to the island’s main Queen Elizabeth Hospital, where medical staff were unable to save him, and he was pronounced dead shortly after arrival from his gunshot injuries. On Wednesday, when Barbados TODAY reached out to Dr Ronnie Yearwood, deputy head of the Faculty of Law at UWI Cave Hill, the senior academic was too distraught over the loss of one of his students to comment on the incident.
Barbadian law enforcement officials have confirmed that this shooting marks the 19th fatal shooting recorded on the island since the start of the calendar year. Investigators from the local police force have launched a full probe into the attack, and are continuing to canvass for witnesses and review evidence as they work to identify and apprehend the perpetrators behind the killing.