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The mur­der toll rose to 71 yes­ter­day fol­low­ing three sep­a­rate shoot­ings in Barataria, Cara­pichaima and Pe­tit Val­ley be­tween Fri­day and yes­ter­day.

In the first in­ci­dent, around 5.40 pm on March 7, res­i­dents re­port­ed hear­ing gun­shots com­ing from the vicin­i­ty of the sa­van­nah and lat­er found Nicholas Sim­mons, 25, of Sev­enth Av­enue, Mal­ick, bleed­ing from wounds to the head, neck, and body. As of­fi­cers ar­rived at the scene, they re­alised Sim­mons was still alive, so they rushed the in­jured man to the Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex, Mt Hope, where he was de­clared dead at 6:02 pm.

Of­fi­cers from the Spe­cial Ev­i­dence Re­cov­ery Unit (SERU) re­cov­ered three 5.56 mm and two 9 mm spent shells at the scene. Re­ports in­di­cate Sim­mons had been seat­ed on a con­crete bench on the west­ern side of the Otis Whit­ley Recre­ation­al Grounds, lim­ing and drink­ing beer with his girl­friend around 5.40 pm, when a sil­ver Nis­san Note stopped in the road, and two armed men ex­it­ed and opened fire on him.