Students, staff get counselling after coach's death

Carl Gilchrist, Gleaner Writer

Staff members at Marcus Garvey Technical High School in St. Ann’s Bay are now in a counselling session, after the coach of the school’s DaCosta Cup football squad was killed in a motor vehicle crash last night.

The coach, 37-year-old Rohan Alexander, died after the taxi in which he was travelling swerved to avoid hitting a horse along the Richmond main road and crashed into a truck heading in the opposite direction sometime after 7 o’ clock.

Principal at the school Leslie Riley, said the entire school population is grieving.

He described the coach as a very popular person not just in the school but in the community.

Riley said the tragedy has affected the school’s preparation for the DaCosta Cup competition.

He said the challenge now lies in getting a new coach to boost the team’s morale, shift their focus from the tragedy and gain their trust.

Alexander has been at Marcus Garvey Technical for about eight years, where he first served as assistant coach then moved on to become the head coach.

He is the second person to die, as a result of a motor vehicle crash in St. Ann in one day.

Bus driver Christopher Hall died yesterday after the bus he was driving crashed into a truck along the St. D’Acre main road.

Several students of the Brown’s Town high school were also injured in the crash and remain hospitalised.

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