Jensen La Vende

The Trin­i­ty Cathe­dral in Port-of-Spain was packed with mourn­ers yes­ter­day at­tend­ing the fu­ner­al ser­vice of Mar­lene Grant, the 57-year-old grand­moth­er who was killed out­side her St Paul Street home last week.Grant's stand­ing in her com­mu­ni­ty was shown by the out­pour­ing of sup­port at her fu­ner­al.Dur­ing the homi­ly, Dea­con Ed­wina Pe­ters said she, too, felt touched by Grant's life as she in­ter­act­ed with the mourn­ers.

Pe­ters said she met a woman be­fore the fu­ner­al and swore by her de­meanour she was Grant's daugh­ter, on­ly to learn it was a neigh­bour. She added this was the mood among all those gath­ered.Pe­ters said how a per­son lived was more im­por­tant than how they died and by the turnout of the gath­er­ing, Grant had lived well.

Pe­ters called on the coun­try to be more for­giv­ing. She added that in spite of the wicked­ness of this world we all must love one an­oth­er and for­give those who do us wrong, ad­mit­ting that it was "not an easy road."Po­lice said Grant was killed on her way to a doc­tor's vis­it by two masked gun­men.The killers, re­ports said, were tired of Grant con­sis­tent­ly op­pos­ing them and their ne­far­i­ous ac­tiv­i­ties.

Three months be­fore she was killed, thugs fire­bombed her home in an at­tempt to get her out but she re­fused to be dri­ven away from her home and the com­mu­ni­ty. She was shot ten times, an au­top­sy said.Her rel­a­tives said they doubt­ed her mur­der would be solved.Dur­ing the eu­lo­gy, which was giv­en by her nephew Shaquille James, who had to be as­sist­ed by his friend Niki­ta Grif­fith, Grant was re­mem­bered for be­ing a hap­py and hard­work­ing woman.

James said his aunt would al­ways bring him joy and no words could ex­press how hurt he was at her killing."She was out­spo­ken and her lega­cy will live on for­ev­er and those of you in the sur­round­ing area where we live will know that."Mar­lene was an open book and there is noth­ing I can say that you all don't al­ready know."