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Woman Sergeant Suffers Stroke At Concert, Died Today
posted (April 1, 2014)
Today, the Police Department mourned the passing of one of their own, 42 year-old Sergeant Kimari Tucker, who had been a police officer for 26 years.

On Saturday, She attended a reggae concert at the ITVET Compound, but while enjoying herself, she passed out after suffering a stroke, and had to be rushed to the KHMH, where she was clinging to life until this morning.

She was being kept alive by machines, and the doctors had recommended that her family consider taking her off of life support because she was brain dead. Unfortunately, her organs began to fail, and she died this morning, taking the difficult choice out of her family's hands. Today, 7News spoke with her family about the few hours before she attended that concert. Here's what they told us:

Neisan Gillett, sister of deceased
"Kamari was in high spirit, she was really excited to go to the concert and I remember her like really happy that day and she got dressed, went out and as soon as she got to the concert she said she felt dizzy and she had a little bit of a headache and she collapsed. My niece and the police officers took her immediately top the Karl Heusner Hospital and when they were there she was unresponsive from the beginning. They did everything that they could and they were able to get a small heartbeat and they help her with her breathing and unfortunately she passed away earlier today."

Daniel Ortiz
"Can you tell us what the doctors have told you was her medical condition?"

Neisan Gillett, sister of deceased
"She has had a really bad history of hypertension and she was very medicated and she had a massive stroke that caused bleeding in her brain and that ending up leaving her brain dead. That was the issue; too much bleeding on the brain."

Reporter
"She was on life support?"

Neisan Gillett, sister of deceased
"Yes, she was on life support - they said that she was brain dead and that the family would have to decide when we were going to take her off the machine. But before that happened, her organs and everything shut down and we didn't have to make that decision. Fortunately for us she made that decision on her own."

Reporter
"If posh had come to shove, would the family would decide to pull the plug on her since the doctors had advised on that?"

Neisan Gillett, sister of deceased
"Honesty, I cannot answer that question. I am juts blessed that Kimari had not put us in that situation - that she decided even at the moments of her life to not put her family in a very uncomfortable situation."

Tucker leaves behind a host of relatives and friends including her 3 children ages 17 to 22 years. She was a well-liked police officer who had a positive reputation in the public, and she had earned a number of awards for her exemplary service. The police flags were flown at half-mast today, in her honour.

Of note is that her common-law husband, 58 year-old Russell Neal, the Former Caretaker of the Lord Ridge Cemetery, was killed in August of 2010. His assailants shot him to death in his home on Neal's Penn Road.

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