AS tension continued to mount in downtown Kingston yesterday, gunmen in St Catherine sought to capitalise on the mayhem, committing several murders in that parish.

Shortly before noon, armed thugs travelling in a white Nissan Sunny motorcar shot dead three men and injured a teenager at a bar and wholesale on Old Harbour Road, near the McCook's Pen community.

The dead men were identified as Peter McDean, 39; Dwayne Murray, 23; and Robert Sankey, 26. The youngster, who was said to be about 14 year old, was shot three times and was taken to the Spanish Town Hospital for treatment.

His condition was not immediately ascertained.

That incident followed the killing of five persons -- including a three-month-old child and a woman -- in the volatile March Pen Road community about 2:00 am.

Two of the dead men were identified as Errol Miller, 53; and Alvin Stewart, 55.

Residents said the armed thugs ordered their victims out of their homes, set the premises on fire, and then peppered them with bullets.

Police responding to the incident were fired on by gunmen in the community. It was not clear up to yesterday afternoon whether anyone was injured in that firefight.

Police also confirmed that two men were killed in the Braeton and Waterford communities in Portmore yesterday, while two others were gunned down in a section of Central Village called 'Big Lane', Monday evening.

Robert Sankey's cousins -- Nastacia Wilson and Laurel Sankey -- broke down in tears at his murder scene yesterday.

For the women -- who said they were also related to Miller and Stewart -- the sight of *lo** dripping from the establishment's verandah was too much to bear.

"Is four (relatives) we lose in one week, look pon it; it wicked for us," mumbled Wilson, who said she had grown tired of crying.

Murray's sister 'Chrissy' cried openly at the crime scene, and lamented the gunmen's brazenness.

"Them tell them that they were police and they must not move, then them kill them. Them kill me brother," she cried, as onlookers, about a foot away, consoled the injured teenager's grieving mother.