A profound tragedy has shaken the Top Hill district of Manchester, Jamaica, following the death of a ten-week-old infant allegedly drowned by his mother, a 20-year-old woman with a documented history of mental illness. The incident occurred on Tuesday morning, sending waves of grief through the small community and raising urgent questions about mental healthcare support systems.
According to Deputy Superintendent Luhas Daniels, acting commander for the Manchester police, the young mother was enrolled in a mental health program at the time of the incident. The tragedy unfolded after the child’s father left for work in a nearby field, leaving the woman alone with their son, Mateo Forbes, who was born on December 21, 2025.
The sequence of events turned horrific when the mother reportedly contacted the infant’s father to confess she had drowned their child in a five-gallon bucket of water. Emergency mental health services responded swiftly, taking the woman into custody and transporting her to a medical facility for treatment.
Geoffrey Forbes, the infant’s paternal grandfather who is also known as Leon, expressed profound shock and community-wide mourning. ‘The whole community grieve, because is the first this ever happen in the district,’ Forbes told reporters, adding that some residents were openly weeping upon learning the news. He revealed troubling background context, noting the woman had previously set fire to his son’s house and had a pattern of disappearing for weeks at a time across multiple towns.
Neighbor Joan Thomas echoed the community’s disbelief, recalling that just the previous evening, the couple had been making plans to christen the baby later this month. ‘The woman and her boyfriend were talking and he said he is going to the bush to draw five bags of carrots to send her to do her hair,’ Thomas recounted, emphasizing that the mother had previously shown attentive care for her child.
The incident has left the child’s father devastated, with family members particularly concerned about his emotional state as he assisted police with paperwork at the local station. Funeral home personnel from Lyn’s Funeral Home were seen at the scene Tuesday afternoon, removing the infant’s body as the community struggled to process the devastating loss.









