A seven-year-old cousin of Leah Lammy, who went missing five months ago, is so traumatised by Leah's disappearance that she has had to receive professional counselling.
Lammy's grandmother, Pearl Simon, said Aaliyah Serville, several other cousins and Lammy's nine-year old brother are all suffering various degrees of trauma. Simon and Lammy's aunts, Christine Francis and Gemini, told the Sunday Guardian at their Tom Street, Longdenville, home on Wednesday, how their lives have been disrupted since Lammy was snatched outside Edinburgh Government School in February.
Simon, who takes Serville to a Port-of-Spain psychologist for counselling, said the two children were very close. "They lived in the same yard and every Saturday morning they played teacher and principal. "Aaliyah was a A student in her Standard One class at Ragoonanan Government Primary School, but since Leah disappeared, her grades dropped right down to C. "Her teacher said when she asks her a question she seems lost and she does incomplete work.
"She doesn't remember what she did for the day either. Her mother was angry with her, and did not understand that she is traumatised. "Aaliyah said it's time Leah comes home and plays with her." Francis said Serville had been writing letters to Lammy every day, begging her to come home. "Up to yesterday, she made a postcard for her." She said when they were leaving a candlelight vigil held by the Missing Persons Association in Woodford Square on June 27, Serville held her five-year-old brother's hand tightly until they got out of the gate.
"She's very fearful about everything."
No joyful noise
Francis said her six-year-old son, Jadan's school work also was affected.
"But he improved and told me he tries to take Leah out of his mind and put himself in his work." Postcards Jadan made for Leah read: "Leah has to come back to our family." "Please release the children now." "Please help us now, Jesus." Simon said another cousin, Emmanuel, "can't cope," and Lammy's ten-year-old brother, Josiah, "is having serious issues. "He's not handling it well. He confides in me. He told me somebody scratched his belly while he was sleeping and he doesn't know if it's Leah. "He says grandma, where you think Leah is. She aint dead yet, ent?
"Josiah is forgetting a lot. You send him in the shop and he forget all what you tell him. "You would think children that age wouldn't feel the way we do, but it seems they're feeling it more. All of them used to play together. "There is no joyful noise in the yard on a weekend any more." Francis said Lammy's relatives, including her mother, are feeling like "everybody write off Leah as dead.
"Nobody's asking about Leah any more. We're not hearing anything from the police, either. "Even the teachers seem to have written her out of the roll book. It's like nobody cares any more." Francis said they were all convinced, however, that Lammy was still alive and her disappearance was linked to Sally Lobai and Riana Parag, who also went missing.
"They were all from the same area and went missing around the same time." Simon said the adults, too, were all traumatised. "Almost every night, from around 11 onwards, I can't sleep. The child keeps surfacing in my mind. "It's a pain you can't explain. She's a baby. She has done nothing. "Every vehicle pass, I get scared. When I go shopping, I feel like Leah's kidnappers are watching me."
Francis said the family did not go out together on outings any more.
"Everybody just moving on automatic," she said. Simon added, "We will never give up. God is an on-time God. We ask for something now and he say to wait, be patient, wait and watch me work." Asked if they had made any headway in investigations in the Lammy case, an officer at Chaguanas Police said, "No; we haven't heard anything as yet."
