Truck driver second death of St George crash

Ervine Barker, driver of one of the two trucks involved in a fatal head-on crash on Tuesday, died yesterday, the eve of his 46th birthday.The resident, of No. 16 Birch Path, Pinelands, St Michael, succumbed to injuries from the collision which claimed the life of 17-year-old Rossi Straughn, of Bottom Close, Wildey, St Michael.Straughn was one of seven passengers on the rear of a white open-back truck driven by Barker. The other vehicle was a blue open-back truck.At Barker’s home, his girlfriend Sharon Blackett and 13-year-old son Kemar described him as a wonderful man. Blackett said she was at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital when he passed away around 1:30 a.m.Blackett said she and Barker, also known as “Rock”, would have marked eight years as a couple next month. She had been looking forward to spending his birthday with him today.“I miss him so much already. I don’t know what I’m going to do without him. ‘Rock’ was my everything. He was a nice, caring and helpful person.“I haven’t slept yet. All I keep thinking is how ‘Rock’ gone and left me here all alone. I know I shouldn’t question God’s doings, but it just doesn’t seem right,” she said, fighting back tears.Kemar said his dad was a careful driver. “Daddy would even spot a ten cents in the road. He always saw things on the road that we wouldn’t see at all.”Kemar said his father loved to entertain people. “He was always making up some song or the other and singing it, and then everyone would be catching on.”Barker was described by brother Stephen Barker as a family man who did his best to “make any situation right”.Barker leaves to mourn five children, Marlon, Keisha, Tamara, Adrianna and Kemar, his brother Stephen and two sisters. (CT)