The grandfather of two-year-old Jamoy Cunningham holds a pair of shoes belonging to the child, who was shot and killed by gunmen in Portmore, St Catherine, on Monday night. - Ricardo Makyn/Staff Photographer

With red swollen eyes, a 78-year-old grandfather sat on his son's bed staring into space near the doorway of a one-room apartment Tuesday.

He was trying to understand why gunmen had showed up at his son's apartment in Kasha Heights, Portmore, the night before and sprayed bullets into the house, killing his two-year-old grandson, Jamoy Cunningham, and injuring his 32-year-old son, an ambitious musician.

The police say the gunmen shot two other men as they ran from the yard. One died in hospital Tuesday. Five persons have been detained in relation to the shooting.

"It sad, you hear sah. Bwoy, me really can't really see what really could have caused it. I really can't give you no other explanation," the shaky, elderly man said as he looked out the doorway. He asked us not to reveal his name nor that of his son.

He believes the incident was all a mistake. He believes the gunmen may have been in search of someone else who was connected to another killing in the community on Sunday.

Claims of innocence

"We a Rasta. Him no deal with violence and them likkle ways. So we no respons(ible) fi war and things like that. We nuh know what guh down with other people because if my bwoy was a violent yute and thing like that, when dem come here last night and knock the door, nobody wouldn't open it, you understand," he said.

He said he could hear the shots from his dwelling, which is a few metres up the road from his son's, but could not bring himself to go to the death house until the following morning.

"'Cause all when me hear, me cyaan believe, because me know seh is not a man that in them things ...

"Him is a man that do music all 'bout the place and him have music that a do well, even Elise Kelly a big him up," he said, still trying to make sense of the tragedy.

The septuagenarian stood up and walked around the room looking at the bullet holes in the wall and his son's posters. As if in a daze, he then walked over to an area where tiny shoes were stacked in a corner and held a pair in his hands and stared at them.

gareth.manning@gleanerjm.com