Stephon Nicholas

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Six­teen years af­ter los­ing her nephew in a jet ski ac­ci­dent in To­ba­go, Kath­leen Roberts is urg­ing for­give­ness for the sus­pect in the death of sev­en-year-old An­gel­i­ca Jo­gie.

An­gel­i­ca was killed on April 8 while bathing with rel­a­tives at Pi­geon Point beach when a jet ski en­tered a des­ig­nat­ed swim­ming area and struck her and three fam­i­ly mem­bers. She was pro­nounced dead at the Scar­bor­ough Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

A 32-year-old sus­pect, who ini­tial­ly fled the scene, was ar­rest­ed at his Canaan home on April 9 but has since been re­leased pend­ing fur­ther in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Roberts said she does not be­lieve the in­ci­dent was in­ten­tion­al.

“Every­body makes mis­takes in life. I have made more than mis­takes; I have made blun­ders, and the Lord was good enough to for­give me my sins and cleanse me from all un­right­eous­ness.

“I don’t think the per­son who was ma­noeu­vring the jet ski in­tend­ed to cause harm to that child. I don’t think so. We must have space for for­give­ness. No­body is per­fect—on­ly Almighty God,” she said.

Roberts al­so op­posed calls for an out­right ban on jet skis, not­ing that op­er­a­tors de­pend on the in­dus­try for their liveli­hoods.

“The peo­ple op­er­at­ing jet skis need to earn a liv­ing. You can im­pose re­stric­tions, but an out­right ban would not be fair. They have fam­i­lies to feed, just like every­one else,” she said.

At a me­dia con­fer­ence on April 9, Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine sig­nalled a clam­p­down on jet ski op­er­a­tions and said an out­right ban was un­der con­sid­er­a­tion. He has pre­vi­ous­ly raised con­cerns about reck­less ac­tiv­i­ty with­in the Buc­coo Reef Ma­rine Park.

The in­ci­dent is the lat­est in a se­ries of jet ski and pirogue-re­lat­ed ac­ci­dents in To­ba­go over the years. In 2010, An­dell Roberts of Mt Pleas­ant died af­ter at­tempt­ing a stunt on a jet ski at Pi­geon Point.

Roberts said she was sat­is­fied with the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly’s han­dling of the mat­ter.

“I am ful­ly sat­is­fied with how the au­thor­i­ties are deal­ing with it. The Chief Sec­re­tary is some­one I know to be fair and God-fear­ing. Sit­u­a­tions like this would af­fect him deeply,” she said.

She added that the THA should not be blamed for the tragedy.

“They did not send the op­er­a­tor to do that,” she said.

Mean­while, An­gel­i­ca’s fa­ther, Arnold Jo­gie, said he is leav­ing the mat­ter in the hands of the au­thor­i­ties fol­low­ing the sus­pect’s re­lease.

“Let it take its course. The po­lice know best,” he said.

An­gel­i­ca was laid to rest on Sat­ur­day fol­low­ing a fu­ner­al at her fam­i­ly’s home in Mon­key Town, Bar­rack­pore. She was lat­er cre­mat­ed at Shore of Peace, Mos­qui­to Creek.