
…tells emotional story of questionable actions of police and nurse
By Lisa Hamilton
Kelsey Bowen, a 23-year-old mother of three, is seeking the truth about how her four-month-old baby died suddenly on March 3, 2021, a day after receiving the routine vaccines administered to babies after birth.
In an extended interview with the Village Voice News on Thursday, Bowen said the matter has caused her great emotional distress as there seems to be some form of a cover-up underway.
On March 2, 2021, four-month-old Keyhon Tafahri Benjamin was alive and well when Bowen took him to the Nabaclis Health Center’s clinic for his four-month vaccine dosage. According to his mother, her child, who had fallen asleep while awaiting the vaccine, was awakened to take it and cried as most babies do in protest.
In other words, this is proof that he was alive at the time. He was given two shots and two drips in his mouth. Bowen then travelled home to Vryheid’s Lust with her child. She was required to work that day so she left little Keyhon with his babysitter.
The babysitter, a woman averaged in her 60s/70s, has been looking after Bowen’s children for some three years, nine months. Bowen said that the babysitter is a trusted woman who, for all the years, has done no harm to her children.
That day, Bowen’s two other children — a four-year-old girl and a one-year-old girl — were also with the babysitter. While at work, Bowen said she called the babysitter to check on her son and was told that his skin got a bit warm during the night but he didn’t experience a major fever.
Afterwork, when Bowen returned home late, little Keyhon and the other girls were already sleeping. As she did most times so as not to disturb them, she allowed them to remain at the babysitter’s residence for an early-morning pick up before she’s expected to go to work.

At about 4:30am the next day, March 3, 2021, Bowen said she was later made aware that the babysitter alleges that she woke up at the said time and fed Keyhon as customary. He would be expected to be fed again at around 6:30am.
However, when the babysitter woke around this time, it is alleged that when she went to check on him he was stretched out and not moving. She called on a neighbour who assisted her with contacting the police.
Not long after, Bowen received the chilling phone call that she should come to the babysitter’s home immediately. When she arrived at the scene just after 7 o’clock the police were already there.
“As I walked in to go into her house police started to speak to me but I wasn’t paying them any mind because I already know something was wrong,” Bowen said.
“I went straight to the room that I know he would normally be in and my son was lying there in the crib in the position he normally sleeps in and the police were speaking and I just started to cry.”
Bowen said that workers from the ambulance told her that they would list her baby’s death as “due to natural causes” because there were no marks on his skin; nothing coming out of his mouth or nose and nothing on his blanket. They said a post-mortem examination (PME) would provide additional information.
Though the police asked her if she suspected foul play, Bowen said she has no reason to suspect such as the babysitter had never wrongfully handled her children. Instead, she told the police that she suspects that the vaccine the child took the day before may have negatively affected him. She worries that it may have been an overdose or maybe an expired drug.
Statements were taken from the individuals involved. She was also asked by a police officer to seek out and sign an affidavit so that her son’s body could be released to her. In the following day(s), in reaching out to the babysitter for her correct lot address for the affidavit, Bowen said that the babysitter cautioned her about the said police officer.
She allegedly told Bowen that the officer was not to be trusted because the officer requested of her $20,000 for reasons undisclosed. Bowen said that this is even as the said police officer has been “pressuring” her to state that she suspects foul play regarding the babysitter and her child.
Bowen put the additional issues aside and on March 5, 2021, went to the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) for the PME. Again, the police officer allegedly requested money but this time from Bowen or her family, claiming that it was normal for families to pay the police who stood in for the PME as it’s usually a sight hard to stomach.
Bowen said she brushed the suggestion away by stating that her family was on the way. However, she faced greater emotional distress when she was not allowed to witness her baby’s PME.
“The post-mortem started and I wasn’t even told that it started…someone from the mortuary told me that I cannot go. My grandmother was there, the father of the child was there, my cousin was there. We all were told that I can’t go, none of us can’t go,” she said.
When the police officer returned, Bowen said she was told: “So, mommy, your son died from choking on his vomit.” Bowen did not accept this because the worker from the ambulance had put her son’s death as natural causes because there were no marks on his skin, nothing coming out of his mouth or nose and nothing on his blanket.

She also wanted to know how her son could have choked on his vomit but died in the position he was sleeping in. The police once again suggested the babysitter but Bowen still does not believe that the babysitter had anything to do with her son’s death.
As a result, Bowen’s family encouraged her to request a toxicology test for her baby. She hoped it would determine whether her baby was adversely affected by the vaccine.
Bowen filled out the paperwork but, in the process, was told that the police officer would have to be involved in the toxicology test as the matter was a police matter and faced resistance when it came to requesting the test.
This time, Bowen said she caused a scene by threatening to take her plight to the media and finally got the attention of the nurses and doctors and was permitted at a date for the test. Bowen postponed her child’s funeral and returned to the hospital mortuary for the test on March 10.
The said policeman was expected to be there at 7am but several calls to her phone from different numbers went unanswered. Bowen, still determined, called the station and later visited but was told that the police was transferred to another station.
“I said now that y’all find out she’s a scamp y’all transfer she instead of doing something about it?” Bowen recounted. Eventually, she was provided with a police officer to participate in the toxicology test.
However, again, Bowen was not allowed to witness the process. She is now awaiting the results which she was told could take some four weeks. In recent developments, she was also allegedly made aware on March 18, 2021 that the nurse who vaccinated her baby has been suspended.
“My thing is that nobody reached out to me, the nurse was suspended. Why did you say he died from his vomit? How come all of a sudden they suspend this nurse without getting proof that it was the vaccine. My thing is, they’re trying to cover up something,” Bowen said.
Bowen contacted the Ministry of Health on March 18 but was only cut short and redirected to another branch. She took her plight to the Village Voice News with the aim of alerting the public of her situation which she said has more questions than answers.
She said: “It’s like they’re just trying to sweep this thing under the mat and just move on with it and I’m really looking for some form of justice.”