Shar­lene Ram­per­sad

All five-year-old Jaden Cud­joe want­ed on Sat­ur­day evening was a "sweet­ie."But the trip to a near­by mi­ni mart for the sweet treat even­tu­al­ly cost the young­ster his life, as he was struck by a mo­tor­cy­cle and killed a stone's throw away from his home. The in­ci­dent which took the First Year Tabaquite Pres­by­ter­ian School pupil's life took place around 6.30 pm along the Tabaquite Main Road, Tabaquite.

How­ev­er, the re­ports on how young Jaden died dif­fer, as his fam­i­ly mem­bers said yes­ter­day he was on the side of the road­way when the cy­clist ca­reened in­to him, fling­ing his small body al­most 30 feet away. His un­cle, Mikhail Joseph, who took him to the Rad­i­ca's Mi­ni Mart that evening, re­called the events lead­ing up to his nephew's death dur­ing an in­ter­view with the T&T Guardian.

"He had just fin­ished bathing and he say he want­ed to go for a sweet­ie in the par­lour. I was hold­ing his sis­ter, Rae-Mur­rie in my arms and he was walk­ing at my side," Joseph said.Joseph said on reach­ing to the front of the mi­ni-mart, a mo­tor­cy­cle came around the cor­ner, swerved and be­gan head­ing straight for them.

"In­stead of slow­ing down, he (cy­clist) keep press­ing more gas. Jaden was on the side of the road next to me and I pulled back and he pick up with Jaden in­stead...he (Jaden) was next to me and the bike was com­ing straight to me, I try to brakes for the ba­by and the bike pick up with him in­stead."

The child, af­fec­tion­ate­ly called 'Bel­lies,' was flung in­to the air and his tiny body rolled un­der a near­by van and came to rest in a drain.

"I run up to him and I was shak­ing him and bawl­ing for his fa­ther to come...he wasn't breath­ing or any­thing. His face, hands, feet, chest...every­thing was cov­ered in bruis­es...he had tyre marks all up the whole side of his body."

Joseph said af­ter the in­ci­dent, he went up to the cy­clist and asked him what hap­pened.

"Af­ter every­thing hap­pened I went up to him and ask him what hap­pen and he say he didn't see Jaden on the side of me."Jaden's moth­er, Mau­ris­sa Cud­joe, was at home at the time of the in­ci­dent and ran out in­to the road­way up­on hear­ing the noise.

"I heard when the bike fell and be­cause the boy (cy­clist) is our neigh­bour, I ran out to see what hap­pened. It's on­ly when I came to the road­side I heard Mikhail scream­ing for my hus­band to come., Cud­joe said.

Cud­joe and her hus­band, Jaime, ran to the child's body and af­ter check­ing for a pulse and not find­ing one, be­gan per­form­ing CPR. The cou­ple then rushed Jaden to the Cou­va Health Fa­cil­i­ty, where he was pro­nounced dead.

"My hus­band was giv­ing breaths and I was do­ing the chest com­pres­sions, we didn't stop un­til we got to Cou­va and they pro­nounced him dead," the dis­traught moth­er said.

Cud­joe, a stu­dent nurse, said at the time she knew the child was dead but she could not bear the thought of him be­ing gone.

"When I checked for the pulse and didn't get any, I knew...but I couldn't give up my ba­by just so...we re­al­ly tried...I would have done any­thing to have my ba­by back," she said be­fore break­ing down in­to tears. Her hus­band, a sec­ondary school teacher, was too dis­traught to speak and had to be con­soled by rel­a­tives. The cou­ple have two oth­er chil­dren, Jaime (Ju­nior), six and Rae-Mur­rie, 18 months.

cy­clist's fa­ther on death

A short dis­tance away from the Cud­joes' home is the mi­ni-mart where young Jaden was head­ing when he was struck and killed.The T&T Guardian un­der­stands that the cy­clist who struck Jaden is a close male rel­a­tive of the own­er of the mi­ni-mart, Ronald Ma­haraj.

Ma­haraj told the T&T Guardian his rel­a­tive suf­fered mul­ti­ple bruis­es about his body and was rest­ing.He ex­pressed sym­pa­thy for Jaden's death, say­ing: "We are friends with that fam­i­ly for the past 23 years and it's un­for­tu­nate that some­thing like this had to hap­pen. No­body would want some­thing like this to hap­pen."

Asked if the rel­a­tive had spo­ken of how the in­ci­dent un­fold­ed, Ma­haraj replied: "He didn't run in­to the child, the child run in­to the road, that is why it's a po­lice thing...the bike in the sta­tion, you could go and ask the po­lice to see it."