BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – MAXWELL BROWNE, one of two men who died by drowning in the Caribbean Sea last Wednesday afternoon (Apr. 2), will be laid to rest tomorrow (Apr. 9) but many of his close relatives, including his mother and children, will not be attending his Homegoing Service.
This is according to the dead man’s daughter, Nikisha Hamilton, who claimed they arrived at that decision because of a strained relationship between her family members and her stepmother whom she said is “a mean and cold-hearted woman”.
Recounting events that occurred on the day her 63-year-old father died, Hamilton said, “Last week Wednesday a guy by the name of Bobby who drives a taxi called and told me to come to Port Zante. While on my way, he called again and asked where I was and I told him that I was by Ram’s Supermarket.
“As I was making my way to Port Zante, a tall guy name John told me that an accident just occurred and that my father can’t be found. I hurriedly made my way to Port Zante where I saw a guard and I told her that I was made to understand that there was an accident and they cannot find my father. She asked who my father was and I said Maxwell Browne. She however told me that the accident just happened and she could not say anything about it, but she advised me to stand and wait.”
Hamilton stated that while waiting for information about her father, she had observed the arrival of some members of the Criminal Investigation Department whom she approached but was told that she would be fed the relevant information following their initial investigation.
She claimed that they requested her name and the relationship between herself and Browne, to which she responded and was told that they would get back to her.
Hamilton said that after speaking with the police she went to the eastern side of Mau Pau and positioned herself on one of the rocks to get a clear view of the divers who were searching for her father.
“While on the rocks, his wife came there with her friend Lynette and I overheard her saying that she just reached because she was working and that it was private property and she can’t go in the area to find out what happened. So, I said, ‘Watch she face, she husband just dead and even if she had no love for my father she ain’t even shed a drop of tear. Why she don’t get from here.’ She then turn off and went upstairs of Mau Pau and sit down with she friend while they were searching for my father.”
The young mother said that some two minutes after crying and praying for her father to be found, someone shouted that the divers had retrieved his body.
“I saw when a fellow was coming on his bike and I shot off to the front and said, ‘Coco is meh father r u just pull up? And he said, ‘Yes…the two ah dem dead.’ I then ran over to the Marina with my friend Lavern Perceval who was there consoling me.”
Hamilton said that members of the Coast Guard had taken the bodies aboard their vessel while she stood by the gate to the Marina crying and asking to see her father.
“Officer Smithen came and said, ‘Where is Nikisha?’ I said, ‘I am here.’ He then said, ‘Hold on, I am going to get back to you.’ Shortly after I saw the ambulance come and I hold the gate and asked who the ambulance come for, but nobody answered. I then said that the ambulance don’t go with dead…who is out there with life in they body and you all don’t want to say nothing? But nobody responded…nobody wanted to give out any information.
“Officer Smithen came back and said, ‘Nikisha, we were made to understand that your father has a wife.’ And I said, ‘I don’t know anything about that…they in for separation.’ He then told me that the wife would have to come to identify the body. She was right there about two feet behind me, my brothers, my sisters, my aunt and my friend Lavern Perceval, but she did not go in.
“The officer came back and called for Nurse Daniel and she was allowed to view the body of her husband. Shortly after, her son-in-law was also allowed to view the body. About three to four minutes after Nurse Daniel’s son-in-law went in, I asked what about my father and the officer said they were made to understand that his wife is out here. She was not responding and her friends pushed her up. When she was going through the gate I grabbed it and said, ‘No! I was here first. What are you trying to tell me? That’s my father out there. She used to ill-treat my father, she used to knock bout my father and up to now she ain’t shed no tear but you letting her in. What you all really doing?’ And an officer said, ‘Miss, we are going to let you in but she has to come down because she is the wife.’”
Hamilton claimed that she was told by an individual that the ambulance was there for her father.
“My father has spent one hour and 21 minutes under the water and the other guy was there for one hour and 24 minutes. But an individual who works at the Port told me that the ambulance came for my father, because when he came up he was frothing from the mouth. The individual also told me that during their training they were told that if someone was retrieved from the water and is frothing, there is a 50/50 chance of that person being alive and they should administer CPR. But they did not administer that to my father. When the lady from the ambulance came, all she did was check his pulse. And when asked about CPR, she said, ‘When you under water what do you expect.’
Hamilton declared that she and her stepmother were not on speaking terms and admitted to verbally abusing her while they were on Port Zante, and also that they have had previous altercations.
“I started busing her and calling her names because I was upset, and because even though she and my father had grievances, we are his kids. She was only married to him for two and a half years, during which time they had many problems with infidelity. I had warned my father not to marry her because I know the kind of person she is.”
Hamilton said she is annoyed over the entire situation because her stepmother had not the “kind courtesy to inform my grandmother of her son’s death”.
She also claimed that many of her father’s close relatives are residing overseas and would have wanted to attend his funeral, but her stepmother had decided that he would be buried tomorrow and would not have it cancelled to accommodate them.
Hamilton explained that her father had removed from the New Road Housing residence that he had shared with his wife and was living with a friend in The Village. He however recently returned to the matrimonial home after the friend died.
She also stated that her father had spoken to another friend with whom he would have shared a home, and that was planned for Thursday (Apr. 3).
This morning (Apr. 8), Hamilton contacted SKNVibes and stated that she, her sister, brother, aunt and other family members went to Mackie Hazel Funeral Home to view her father’s body, but the owner said that his wife had instructed that permission not be given.
At about 5:15 p.m. on Wednesday (Apr. 2), Browne and Rudolph ‘Tone’ Dowell had drowned in the Caribbean Sea in the vicinity of Port Zante after the boat in which they were capsized while they were in the process of releasing the lines for the departure of one of two cruise ships that visited St. Kitts.
Dowell was an employee of the St. Christopher Air and Sea Ports Authority (SCASPA) and Browne, captain of the capsized vessel named PIX, was an employee of S.L. Horsford & Co. Ltd.
According to Hamilton, those left to mourn the passing of Maxwell ‘Mackie’ Browne, also known as ‘Sand Crab’, are his mother Evelyn Browne of Nevis; children - Nikisha, Browne, Sashina, Dabbian and Rakiya; sisters – Carmen, Celestine and Vardis; and 13 grandchildren.
