KINGSTON, Jamaica — More than a year after a 20-year-old bartender was killed by a police officer’s service weapon at a Clarendon parish hotel, the Jamaican law enforcement officer has been formally charged with gross negligence manslaughter. The accused, 28-year-old Tavoy Hussey, a serving constable with the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF), was linked to the shooting death of his girlfriend Jimoy Suckoo, who went by the nicknames Janay and Nay, at Hotel Versalles in May Pen.
Suckoo, a resident of Paradise in Westmoreland, was struck by a single bullet to the chest from Hussey’s service-issued Glock pistol during the January 12, 2025 incident. In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, Hussey provided conflicting accounts of how the gun discharged, prompting an extensive joint probe by the Independent Commission of Investigations (Indecom), Jamaica’s independent police oversight body, and internal JCF investigators. The findings of that investigation were passed to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP), which ultimately authorized the manslaughter charge against the constable.
In Hussey’s first statement to authorities, he claimed he had set his loaded service pistol on the bed where Suckoo was resting. He told investigators he turned his back to the bed before hearing a gunshot, and turned around to find Suckoo fatally wounded. Later, during questioning at May Pen Police Station, he gave a markedly different version of events: he told investigators he was removing his pistol from his leg holster to secure it before going to get food when the weapon slipped from his grasp. In his second account, he said he tried to catch the falling gun, and accidentally squeezed the trigger, firing the round that killed Suckoo.
Following the filing of charges, Hussey was granted bail set at $1.5 million Jamaican dollars, secured by one to two approved sureties, and subject to regular reporting conditions. He is scheduled to next appear in court for proceedings on September 3, 2026.
The case marks the latest law enforcement charge to come out of Indecom’s oversight work. Data from the commission shows that since January 2024, a total of 64 law enforcement officers across Jamaica have been charged in connection with incidents investigated by Indecom. Of those charges, nine were brought in 2026 alone: eight against serving JCF officers and one against a correctional officer.