WESTERN BUREAU:

Every fortnight Ricky Blake religiously took time off his job in Burnt Ground, Hanover, to spend time with his one-year-old daughter in Springmount, St James.

She would always look forward to seeing him and only yesterday her grandmother, Gloria Ormsby, kissed her and told her she would be seeing her dad in another two days. Sadly, that was not to be.

Blake, popularly called 'Behe' and 'Channer', of Springmount, had his neck severed during what family members said was a love triangle. Blake would have celebrated his 23rd birthday on February 14.

Blake was a caretaker at the Royal Rest Cemetery in Burnt Ground, which is owned by the Delapenha Funeral Home in Montego Bay.

The Ramble police, who are investigating the incident, had not yet collated the facts surrounding the matter up to late last evening, as they were still collecting statements. But THE STAR was informed that Blake was at work after 2 p.m. when he received a phone call.

He told his colleagues he would soon be back and left. It is understood that he saw his daughter's mother speaking with someone and an altercation developed. Shortly after, a man chopped Blake on the neck, severing it and escaped. A passerby saw Blake lying in *lo** and summoned the police.

"When I heard, I cried all the way home," Ormsby said, lamenting how she constantly begged her son to quit the relationship he was in because it could lead to him being killed, but he never obeyed.

"Mi son, mi son. I really miss him, but he has the hope of a resurrection because God's words are true, so I know I will see him again," said Ormsby, a farmer and a mother of eight. Blake was her sixth child.

The Ramble police are now searching for Blake's kille