THE police must also be blamed for the workings of under-pressure cult-like church, Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries, one former member insists.The ex-member said that police continually disregarded reports made abo...

MONTEGO BAY, St James - For over eight years, congregants of Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries here were hoodwinked into handing over the first pay cheque that they received each year.Speaking to the Jamaica Observer...

One woman whose role in the struggle against the eradication of polio from Jamaica was pivotal has been reflecting on the island's journey with the disease and the lessons that the population can learn from it.As Jamaica and the world ...

Declaring, "We are not out for blood," two daughters of the elderly Jamaican-Canadian couple murdered in 2018 have expressed satisfaction with the sentence handed down on Thursday by Supreme Court judge Justice Lorna Shelly Williams to ...

Retired Senior Superintendent of Police Reneto Adams says the 'cut-throat' religion practised at the Montego Bay-based Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries should not come as a surprise.Adams, unyielding in his view, h...

MONTEGO BAY, St James - It was seven long years of hell for a man who was shot and stabbed during last Sunday's human sacrifice rituals at Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries here.So bad was his experience that he deci...

A member of Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries has shared a graphic and chilling account of last Sunday night's events at the church that spiralled into the killing of two congregants in what has been described as a h...

THE recent abductions of nine-year-old Phylisa Prussia and 13-year-old Winshae Barrett are affecting another St Thomas minor, who finds it hard to stay at home alone.Sidia Crockshank, 13, is the one facing that challenge.With smartphone...

The Department of Correctional Services (DCS) has confirmed an increase in the number of COVID-19 cases among the inmate population at the St Catherine Adult Correctional Centre in recent weeks. In a statement yesterday, the DCS said th...

When Tara Playfair-Scott discovered a lump in her breast in 2016, the first thing she did was take to Google to research and self-diagnose.The marketing and public relations consultant, who was speaking at the second in a three-part ser...

Melbourne Flake, the 81-year-old Jamaican-Canadian who was murdered with his wife Etta in 2018, loved Jamaica and defended it every chance he got, rejecting any notion of it being "the murder capital" of the world.That he and his 70-yea...

THIS week's column will address several critical and intersecting health-care indices that closely correlate with patient outcomes but are poorly understood by the public. Efficient and high-quality health-care delivery requires a robus...

LONDON, United Kingdom (AFP) - Queen Elizabeth II turned down a prize celebrating the elderly, assessing that at 95 she did not meet the criteria, The Oldie magazine said last week.The publication wrote to palace officials in July to as...

The World Health Organization (WHO) says it is important for health providers to meet the specific needs of the older population.It listed:1) training for health professionals in providing care for older people;2) preventing and managin...

The past six months have been agonising for Kumar Bent and Sashagay Harris-Bent.The couple has been left to wonder why their son, Kaleb, died just two days after being born. In fact, they say they haven't been able to properly move pas...

THE news of a breast cancer diagnosis tends to throw women out of balance.For breast cancer survivor Dr Elorine Turner Pryce, this happened to be true in more ways than one. The 55-year-old remembers feeling as though she had been hit b...

A former St Ann Festival Queen has joined the fight against breast cancer.Chantalle Bryan, in a bold good Samaritan move, is donating part proceeds from the sale of her business' T-shirts to the Ocho Rios branch of the Jamaican Cancer S...

While filling customers' bags with vegetables and ground provision, 31-year-old Petagay Pinnock, a market vendor, filled her bag with Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) subjects.As she served customers and made change aft...

Lying does not suit Thompson-HerahElaine Thompson Herah is one of athletics' great sprinters of all time. Anyone who can win back-to-back Olympic gold medals in the 100 and 200 metres must be included in the hall of greatness.But there ...

BIRTH control is any method used to prevent pregnancy. There are less reliable methods such as the 'pull out technique' and others such as condoms, intrauterine devices (IUDs), birth control pills, the rhythm method, tubal ligation and ...

Little did Stephanie Thompson know that her routine bath by the river in her community of Copper's Lane, Bath, in St Thomas, would result in her fighting off an attack from a man hell-bent on raping her.Thompson, 45, told the Jamaica Ob...

OCTOBER is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and as the month rolls on you will get a great deal of information on how to identify the signs and symptoms of breast cancer and how to make sure you can catch it early. Understanding what route...

Sandals Resorts International (SRI) has congratulated three stalwarts of the luxury resort chain who were honoured for their outstanding contribution to tourism at both the national and parish levels during the honours and awards cerem...

THE infrastructural and cultural changes necessary to facilitate universal access in corporate Jamaica was the main topic of discussion during Digicel Foundation's high-level conference on 'Overcoming Challenges to Workplace Inclusivity...

IN recent times Mandeville Regional Hospital has been seeing much better days, says chief executive officer at the facility, Alwyn Miller. The hospital, with 120 doctors and which suffered a bed dilemma two months ago, resumed elective ...

Wretched in this alone,That thou mayst take all this away, And me most wretched take.The only thing that makes me miserable Is the thought that you might one day reject me....And that would make me even more miserable.- ShakespeareREJEC...

A Bank of Jamaica (BOJ) financial stability report stated that the Jamaican economy suffered a drastic decline in economic activity in 2020 due to the pandemic. Both consumer and business confidence were low. Household debts recorded gr...

Kevin Simpson says he spares no effort to share the life-threatening encounters he has had with gunmen while operating his taxi. His aim, he said, is to ensure that his fellow taxi drivers remain vigilant while working, or even in the c...

Opposition Senator Lambert Brown has accused the Government of being lax in advancing the rights of the disabled community and pointed to what he said was an absence of clear provisions to accommodate those individuals for COVID-19 vacc...

The Jamaica Evangelical Alliance (JEA) yesterday described as evil and demonic the deadly religious ritual which reportedly occurred at Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries of Montego Bay on Sunday and said the Christi...

A call this week for the Government to make the Sex Offender Registry open to the public appears to be gaining traction on the streets.Betty Ann Blaine, founder of children's advocacy organisation Hear The Children's Cry, made the call ...

Communications and entertainment provider Flow Jamaica is staging its second Vax Day tomorrow at the Jamaica Pegasus hotel in New Kingston as it continues its support for the Government's national vaccination programme.The initiative c...

J Wray & Nephew (JWN) yesterday said it has asked the Government for an urgent clarification of the policy relating to the alcohol sector contributing to public sector causes.The request came in a response to a directive from Minist...

MANDEVILLE, Manchester - British High Commissioner to Jamaica Judith Slater has pledged to support Jamaica with its vaccination efforts.Slater, who was addressing an award and partnership launch ceremony hosted by Manchester's Custos Ga...

COP26, the next annual United Nations climate change conference, has been described by many as the last chance for the world to take a unified position on this looming crisis, and new British High Commissioner to Jamaica Judith Slater i...

LONDON, United Kingdom - The travel and tourism sector in the Caribbean is recovering at a faster rate than any other region in the world, with its contribution to gross domestic product (GDP) expected to increase by just over 47 per ce...

The International Council of Pentecostal Bishops (ICOPB) yesterday denounced the behaviour of Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries leader Kevin Smith and confirmed that it had severed ties with him because he has breach...

Up to press time yesterday the police remained tight-lipped about the circumstances surrounding the capture of one of the region's most wanted men, Mario Antonio Palacios, in Jamaica.Palacios, a Colombian, who served as a military offi...

MONTEGO BAY, St James - An investigation has been launched into the conduct of two policemen who provided motorcycle escort for a motorcade for now-disgraced leader of Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries Kevin Smith as...

Imam Yasin Abu Bakr, the man who led an attempt to overthrow the Trinidad and Tobago Government in 1990, died last night, the Trinidad Express newspaper reported.Notice of the Islamic leader's passing was posted on the Facebook page o...

Supreme Court judge Justice Lorna Shelly Williams yesterday slapped Fabian Skervin with two life sentences for the 2018 murder of a Jamaican-Canadian couple in Retreat, St Thomas, saying that the evidence in what was clearly a "premedit...

MONTEGO BAY, St James - For an entire month in March of last year, 70 congregants of Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries, who were told to pay $100,000 each for entry into Kevin Smith's 'ark', slept on concrete floors ...

Prime Minister Andrew Holness yesterday said that one of the individuals from whom he drew inspiration when he decided to enter representational politics more than 20 years ago was General Colin Powell, the American son of Jamaican immi...

Chief Justice Bryan Sykes, while heaping praises on the law faculty of the University of the West Indies, has urged that body to explore the development of courses within the law degree programme to equip graduates to manage other aspec...

Member of Parliament (MP) for St Thomas Eastern Dr Michelle Charles has called for more technological resources for the police so that they can monitor offenders as part of measures to clamp down on crime.She made the call during her pr...

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, (CMC ) - All students in forms four to six have been instructed to return to the classroom next Monday, whether or not they are vaccinated against COVID-19, and all online classes for them will be discontinued, ...

Today is the 295th day of 2021. There are 70 days left in the year.TODAY'S HIGHLIGHT1918: The Great Influenza Epidemic begins. During World War I, over 18 million people die from the flu virus. OTHER EVENTS1721: Peter the Great takes t...

OCHO RIOS, St Ann - A man is reported to have committed suicide after allegedly attempting to murder his common-law-wife last weekend, a few years after his brother died under similar circumstances.The man, who was found hanging on the ...

A vigil to highlight Paul Bogle's contribution to St Thomas has been planned for October 24, 2021 by a foundation named in his honour and headed by a great-great grandson of the national hero.According to Constantine Bogle, who is also ...

Recently accredited British High Commissioner to Jamaica Judith Slater has listed increasing trade and investment between the United Kingdom (UK) and the island as one of her main goals during her tour of duty.In her maiden media inter...