Kingston: Jamaican police have said that two US missionaries were found slain in a rural area of the Caribbean island that has long struggled with high rates of violent crime.
In a statement, the Jamaica Constabulary Force identified the two men as Randy Hentzel, 48, and Harold Nichols, 53.
Their battered bodies were found in bushes in separate areas of St Mary parish.
There have been no arrests. Investigators have not issued a possible motive.
Police did not provide hometowns for the victims.
Hentzel’s Facebook page said he was from Donnellson, Iowa.
Nichols’ hometown was not immediately clear.
Both missionaries lived and worked in Jamaica for a Pennsylvania-based religious organisation called Teams for Medical Missions. The two men and their families did evangelism and Bible ministry and built homes.
The religious group and the US Embassy in Jamaica did not immediately provide comment about the killings.
On social media, fellow missionary Merlin Pratt said he was told the two men were killed on their way to check on the foundation of a house they were building for an impoverished family.
“Harold and Randy were both great men of God who just loved Jamaica,” Pratt wrote on Facebook.
Jamaica had at least 1,192 slayings in 2015, a roughly 20 per cent increase from the previous year. Jamaica, a country of about 2.7 million people, has long been ranked among the most violent countries in the world.
PTI
