The mother of a teenager Jay-Z Joseph, who died after police shot him in Vieux Fort on Tuesday, wants answers regarding the incident.
” Up to today, I have not gotten any answers yet,” Noelita Wells told reporters on Thursday.
Wells acknowledged that many stories about the circumstances of the 19-year-old’s death have been circulating.
However, Wells explained that all she knows is that her son is dead.
” I tried to ask questions. I tried to get information. I have not gotten any information. Nothing as yet. When I went to the police, all they would say was, ‘Hold on. Hold on somebody is going to assist you.’ I want to know what happened to my son,” the mother stated.
Wells recalled visiting St. Jude Hospital after hearing her son had been shot and learning that he had lost a lot of blood.
She also recalled hearing assurances that the teenager was fine after the shooting, later learning that Jay-Z was in critical condition at the hospital, and afterward receiving a call that he had succumbed.
Wells told reporters she asked why the medical facility had amputated the teenager’s foot, and the response was it was an attempt to save his life.
“I am just trying to remain calm. Trying to to be aggressive not helping. All I want to do is face that officer who did it. I just want to ask the officer, ‘ How are you feeling right now? Do you have anything to say to me.?’ I am not going to be angry or bitter at him. ‘I just want to know, what do you have to say to me.’”
Wells said she did not want to be like the hypocrites, and because Jay-Z was her son, echo what she described as the national anthem of ‘He was a good boy!’
She said Jay-Z was trying to move from where he was to where he wanted to be.
Wells said people would tell her Jay-Z was loving, sweet, and charming.
“When I was down there they were telling me they don’t know him to be any person who liked trouble,” Wells told reporters.
“There is a saying when you try to take the horse to the river, you cannot force it to drink water,” the mother observed.
“I tried everywhere in power to remove him out of there, and like the guy said, Shanty Town isn’t a bad place. People make it believe that it is a bad place,” the New Village resident asserted.
A police release on Tuesday’s fatal shooting said officers had responded to reports of armed males wearing face masks in Bruceville, Vieux Fort.
The police said they pursued but failed to apprehend another male individual.
