The tight-knit residential community of Chapman Lane, St Michael, is grappling with fresh grief and growing fear after a third local resident was killed in a fatal shooting this year, an incident that has sent waves of frustration through a neighborhood already battered by persistent violent crime. The victim, 30-year-old Jameson Fields, who lived on 3rd Avenue in Chapman Lane and was affectionately known to neighbors as Juni, was gunned down in a public space on Sunday afternoon, pushing the Caribbean island of Barbados’s total murder count for the calendar year to 33. According to initial police and eyewitness accounts, at approximately 5:35 p.m. on Sunday, Fields was sitting near a small shed in Hutson Alley, located in the heart of Bridgetown, when an unidentified attacker opened fire on him. Emergency responders rushed the wounded 30-year-old to the island’s main public care facility, Queen Elizabeth Hospital, but medical teams were unable to save him, and he was pronounced dead shortly after arrival from his gunshot injuries. When a team from local outlet Barbados TODAY visited the Chapman Lane neighborhood one day after the shooting, residents spoke openly about their exhaustion with the cycle of violence that has repeatedly rocked their community over the past 12 months, saying they have grown weary of near-constant shootings and live in daily fear for the safety of the children who grow up in the area. “Too much of this, it has to stop,” one long-time Chapman Lane resident told reporters. “You can never get used to this, you always have to watch your children closely. It’s such a blessing that no little kids were outside when this shooting happened—this alley is right through where so many young kids play every day, and this happened so early in the evening. It’s just awful.” The woman recalled that she was woken from rest by a neighbor knocking on her door to alert her that shots had been fired near the alley. She said she ran outside immediately, fearing for her own daughter who lives a short distance from the shooting site, and arrived to find Fields lying motionless on the ground. “I ran out right away because my daughter lives nearby, and I saw him laying there. I still couldn’t believe what I was seeing,” she said. She went on to recount the string of killings that have hit the small community in just the first few months of this year, noting: “We’ve had three murders right here this year. One happened right at this spot, another one was around the back, and now this one here.” Another local resident expanded on the scope of recent violence, saying the latest killing brings the total number of homicides in the immediate area to four in less than 12 months, dating back to the end of June last year. Beyond the grief of losing another community member, neighbors remembered Fields as a warm, friendly young man with a playful sense of humor who was universally liked across Chapman Lane. “He was such a nice, quiet kid, I just can’t believe this is real,” one emotional resident told Barbados TODAY. “He would walk through the neighborhood all the time, crack jokes with people, always made everyone laugh. Just last week I was sitting at home and he came through messing around, making noise like a siren. People told him he had to stop, because folks would think there was an emergency going on, but that was just his playful way.” The resident also shared concern for Fields’ mother, saying the sudden, violent loss of her son has had a severe impact on her health. “I heard she’s not doing well at all. This is her child, of course her blood pressure went through the roof. You don’t know what this feels like unless you’ve gone through it yourself,” she said.