Stephon Joseph.
Fifteen-year-old Felicity Florton – a student of St. Georges Secondary School – who was brutally stabbed by a young man in Pavee, Castries had shared a relationship with her accused attacker.
The victim’s mother, Heather Charles told St Lucia News Online (SNO) in an exclusive interview today (June 16) that her daughter admitted to having a previous relationship with 18-year-old Stephon Joseph, who is alleged to have stabbed her and left her bleeding on the roadside.
Charles said that Florton and the accused were friends. She recalled her daughter had just started secondary school when she met Joseph, who was at the time a third form student. However, Charles said once she had given her daughter a cellular phone, she realised the two were communicating often than normal and it soon became out of hand.
Charles claimed she had warned her daughter not to speak with any boys, since she realised that her daughter was on the phone “day and night.”
After she had a serious discussion with her daughter about cutting communication with Joseph, Charles said she was under the impression they had stopped talking since she never heard anything about the young man again.
“She told him that his mother said to stay away from her and ended all ties with the young man,” Charles said, according to the impression Florton gave her. However, Charles told SNO that in a recent conversation with her daughter at her hospital bed, she told her what happened on the day of her attack.
Florton told her mother that Joseph met her at Blue Coral Mall, grabbed her hand and said he wanted to speak with her. They were walking towards Pavee, Castries.
However, Charles said, “I believe when he took her hand and she realised where he was taking her and she turn her back and run back to town that is when he stabbed her… she had a mind like he wanted to rape her or something … or have sex with him … When she reached for a stone and looked up to pelt him, she was stabbed in the eye.”
By that time, Florton was unable to see properly because of the out pour of blood on her face. She was again stabbed several times, before she started shouting for help. She was unable to move.
She reportedly sustained 11 stab wounds. Charles said she is worried about her daughter’s condition. The most serious wound was to her back. Her lungs are ruptured as a result and has caused severe internal bleeding, the health professionals have told the woman.
“They say if it doesn’t stop bleeding she will have to do a major operation between life and death. I only hoping that they don’t,” Charles lamented
On Sunday, doctors had to provide Florton with oxygen because she was having difficulty breathing.
“They had to put the tube in another place, because the blood was coming out of it,” Charles explained.
The teenage girl has already had seven x-rays done on her eye. “But when I left, they had to take her to the ex-tray room yesterday. This morning when I went there she wasn’t there; the Cuban doctor was treating her eye. When they brought her back in they rushed her to the emergency room but she is not aware what it is for.”
Charles said she is happy to hear that Joseph was charged for attempted murder. The woman told SNO she would like to see that he is given the full penalty for his action.