By Laurina B. Lormia
(Intern)
The mother of a 19-year-old girl named Rejoice Taffee, is seeking justice and inquiry into ascertaining the cause of her daughter’s death.
Mother, Rose Taffee, an Immigration officer and resident of Paynesville GSA Road, November 7, 2023, reported the death of her daughter Rejoice Taffee, explaining that the deceased, who was a student of the Stella Maris Polytechnic, went to visit her friend, Identified as Gifty, on October 7, 2023, and never returned but was discovered dead the next morning.
According to Rose, while on her way from work that evening, she got a call from the deceased asking for permission to visit her friend Gifty, a request the mother consented to without hesitation.
“Early that morning, she got a call from the suspect that her daughter is dead and they took her at the ELWA hospital. Upon her arrival at the hospital, some staffers and security told her at the entrance that the deceased is still in the car in the hospital yard, that the corpse of her daughter is expired and she died 2 hours before reaching the hospital,” Rose explained.
According to her, she told her husband to contact the police at Zone 8 for further investigation; when the police got there, they opened the car and found the deceased covered with 2 blankets.
“She had foam coming out of her mouth, her hands and fingers were all green, her stomach was swollen like a 7-month-old pregnant woman, white water was coming out of her like a pump, she had neither clothes nor underclothes on, and her hair was cut off her head,” she narrated.
However, during the investigation, the suspect said the deceased entered her house and she never came out until early that morning. When she woke up to urinate, she tried waking the deceased up but she was not responding.
She alluded that Rejoice left in her sleep.
According to the driver who took the corpse to the hospital, he said that he never saw the body of the deceased; he only agreed to put the body in his car and carry it to the hospital.
Rose, who also worked as a State security, said that the police did not investigate the case well with the suspect and driver, wondering why the police officers allowed the driver to go.
She concluded by saying, the police family of Gifty was ordered by the officer to take the body at the funeral home, and they took photos of the deceased to destroy evidence while on their way to LNP headquarters.
The police from Zone 8 took the statement and photos from Gifty and placed in a file, the ones from the funeral home.
The victim’s parents are seeking justice and calling on the Liberia National Police (LNP) to investigate the case well, and also for the Government of Liberia to do an autopsy to know the actual cause of their daughter’s death.
