Mom sent kids to dad in hope of better life
VETERAN JOURNALIST and Toronto Star columnist Royson James, who visited Melonie’s mother, Opal Austin, in Jamaica, and covered the case, said her family would be pleased to hear that the court dismissed Biddersingh’s appeal.
He said, when they heard that Everton was seeking to appeal the verdict, they were quite distressed.
“They were flabbergasted. They couldn’t understand – after going through all that for so long, for so many years, and then finally, in their eyes, getting some justice – that the court would then turn around and then give Mr Biddersingh another shot and another chance,” James said
They asked him several times for an explanation and he told them that, in the legal system, an individual has a right to ask for an appeal.
James said that, from talking to Austin, it seems that she still has not recovered from the tragedy and has “all sorts of effects”, including not being able to sleep well.
“This is a mother who saw some light into the darkness in which she found herself with seven kids and figured that here’s a chance for two of the kids to go to Canada and make better of themselves and then maybe come back and help the family. And the whole thing just blew up in her face; she lost the two youngest children,” James said.
One of Melonie’s brothers who had also migrated with her, Dwayne, died earlier in what the police said was a suicide, but the family has never accepted that story.
Everton had said that Melonie ran away from home to New York and Austin would give anyone travelling abroad a picture and a note to try to find her daughter.
Austin found out several years later that Melonie met a horrible death and – according to the courts – at the hands of her father.