Current events
On the 25th anniversary of the day that altered the world, and altered it for the even worse, personnel at the United States Embassy in Port of Spain will stop briefly to keep in mind the almost 3,000 individuals who passed away in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
As they have actually done every year because, wreaths will be laid at the base of 2 cenotaphs on the embassy substance on Marli Street, where the names of Trinidad and Tobago nationals who passed away that day are engraved.
There are 14 names, however among them seems incorrect.
Joan Francis has actually been noted for 25 years as one of the Trinidad and Tobago victims of 9/11.
The Express has actually invested the previous 5 years attempting to develop who she was.
We discovered no age, address, profession. or household. No validated connection to the World Trade Center, no death certificate and no reference on the main United States list of 2,977 victims.
And no Joan Francis at the 9/11 Memorial and Museum in New York.
Rather, the proof indicates another Trinidadian female-Joyce Rose Cummings.
Cummings was born in Trinidad on June 17, 1936, later on transferred to the United States and settled in Brooklyn. She was 65 when she passed away on September 11, 2001.
Her name is engraved into the bronze memorial at Ground Zero.
Her death is tape-recorded in a probate file released in the Trinidad and Tobago Gazette.
And, in January 2002, The Watchtower reported that Cummings, initially from Trinidad, had actually been near the World Trade Center when the attacks took place, was gotten rid of by smoke, required to health center and passed away.
Her name is not amongst the 14 Trinidadian names kept in mind each year at the United States Embassy in Port of Spain.
Rather, it is Joan Francis who stays there, for a quarter of a century.
The secret
Every September because the attacks, United States ambassadors and embassy personnel have actually collected at the 2 memorials in Port of Spain to bear in mind the Trinidad and Tobago nationals who passed away.
The names are:[
Who was Joan Francis?
Did she pass away on September 11?
Did she ever live?
Those concerns have actually stayed unanswered.
In the days following the attacks, recognizing the dead was an extraordinary job. Some victims were never ever physically recuperated. Others were at first thought to have actually passed away however were later on discovered alive. Households reported loved ones missing out on. Health centers dealt with survivors. Authorities overcame lists of individuals who had actually remained in the towers, on the pirated aircrafts and in the surrounding location.
Trinidad and Tobago was no various.
The nation was attempting to develop which of its people had actually been captured up in the catastrophe countless miles away.
The Trinidad and Tobago Consulate in New York developed a hotline with the workplace of then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani as it attempted to identify who had actually passed away.
Fourteen names ultimately made their method to the Consulate.
Those names were transferred to Trinidad and Tobago.
And in some way, Joan Francis turned into one of them.
Searching for Joan
The Express started questioning the name years back.
We browsed the main United States records of those eliminated in the attacks.
We browsed survivor lists.
We browsed legal files developing from the attacks, consisting of lawsuits including victims and their households.
We browsed memorial and remembrance sites.
We browsed the records of the 9/11 Memorial and Museum.
There was no Joan Francis.
At Ground Zero, the names of 2,977 victims are engraved.
There is no Joan Francis.
Throughout the yearly reading of the victims’names, there is a Pauline Francis from Barbados.
There is a Virgin Francis from Dominica.
There is no Joan Francis.
There are referrals to her on the web.
Some individuals have actually published homages to her, obviously thinking she was amongst those eliminated.
One memorial message checks out:”Whenever I search for your name, Ms Joan Francis. Nobody has actually ever declared you … I will NEVER forget you.”
Another states:”Joan, you remain in the ideas of my heart. I will not forget you. ”
They are homages to a lady whose presence as a 9/11 victim has actually never ever been developed.
How did the name arrive?
Individuals knowledgeable about the procedure informed the Express that the response might depend on the remarkable situations surrounding the weeks after the attacks.
The Trinidad and Tobago Consulate in New York preserved details on nationals, consisting of individuals signed up with the Consulate and information linked to passports.
In the after-effects of September 11, that info entered into the effort to determine Trinidad and Tobago nationals who may have been amongst the dead.
The Consulate, then headed by Terrence Walker, looked for verification of the deaths.
Fourteen names were provided.
The names came home to Trinidad and Tobago at an especially rough time.
The nation had actually gone through a political crisis, a modification of federal government and, ultimately, another basic election.
While federal governments altered and the nation moved on, the 14 names stayed.
Nobody openly challenged Joan Francis being amongst them.
For 25 years, she was kept in mind as a Trinidadian victim of 9/11.
The look for responses
In 2020, the Express took its findings to the United States Embassy in Port of Spain and asked whether the embassy might individually validate Joan Francis as a victim.
The action was that the names of the Trinidad and Tobago nationals who passed away in the attacks had actually been supplied to the embassy by the Trinidad and Tobago Consulate in New York.
The Express then got in touch with the Ministry of Foreign and CARICOM Affairs.
The Ministry directed the paper to consular administrator Mary Tang Yew at the Consulate in New York.
The Consulate consequently examined.
It found a 9/11 file and, according to details offered to the Express, sent its findings to the Ministry of Foreign and CARICOM Affairs around October 18, 2022.
The Express has actually consistently asked the Ministry to divulge what that examination discovered.
There has actually been no reaction.
In August 2024, an Express reader offered a lead that would alter the examination.
The lady who was missing out on
The suggestion led the Express to Joyce Rose Cummings.
Cummings was born upon June 17, 1936, in the location around the Queen’s Park Savannah and Belmont.
She ultimately left Trinidad for the United States, settling in Brooklyn.
She left her Trinidad home in the care of a female who would ultimately become its owner.
The scenarios surrounding her death, nevertheless, led back to September 11, 2001.
Authorities records reveal Cummings as having passed away that day.
A probate notification released in the Trinidad and Tobago Gazette supplies additional proof. In February 2001, Cummings had actually called Lerita Bruce, of Rosslyn Street, Belmont, as her sole executrix. The subsequent grant of probate taped Cummings’date of death as September 11, 2001.
The Express took a trip to the Belmont address and talked to individuals linked to Cummings.
They stated she had a boy in the United States who would have been entitled to gain from the September 11 Victim Compensation Fund.
They likewise stated her Trinidadian loved ones grieved her death.
Cummings was never ever openly acknowledged as one of Trinidad and Tobago’s 9/11 victims.
And nobody appears to have actually remedied the authorities record.
There is little public record of her life.
There is one amazing account.
‘Joyce Cummings, aged 65′
In its January 8, 2002 edition, The Watchtower released an account of Jehovah’s Witnesses who passed away in the attacks.
It mentioned that amongst those eliminated were at least 14 Witnesses who had actually been “at or near the scene of the disaster”.
It then determined:
“Joyce Cummings, aged 65 and initially from Trinidad.”
The publication stated Cummings had an oral visit near the World Trade Center on the early morning of the attacks.
She was obviously gotten rid of by smoke, was required to a close-by health center and might not be conserved.
It explained her as a “extremely zealous evangeliser”.
That account was released less than 4 months after the attacks.
Twenty-five years later on, Joyce Rose Cummings’ name stays inscribed at Ground Zero.
It is missing from the Trinidad and Tobago memorial at the United States Embassy.
Ground Zero
In December 2024, Express press reporter Richard Charan took a trip to New York– not as a traveler, however as a reporter on an objective.
After more than 20 years of narrating the occasions and after-effects of September 11, Express reporter Richard Charan went to Ground Zero in December 2024 to see for himself, strolling to the South Tower memorial.
And there, amongst countless names engraved into bronze, was hers:
JOYCE ROSE CUMMINGS.
It was a minute of verification, however likewise among unhappiness.
For while Joyce’s name is protected at the website where she was grieved as a victim of the attacks, Trinidad and Tobago has actually invested 25 years keeping in mind another name, Joan Francis.
A name for which the Express has actually discovered no matching victim in the main United States record.
Therefore, on the 25th anniversary of September 11, the concern is no longer just who was Joan Francis.
Why has Trinidad and Tobago stopped working to acknowledge Joyce Rose Cummings?
The info about Cummings was officially offered to the Ministry of Foreign and CARICOM Affairs on February over a number of years, with an ask for feedback.
There has actually been no action.
The United States Embassy has formerly stated it counts on the main list provided by Trinidad and Tobago.
Orange Grove Memorial Gardens in Trincity nevertheless, there has actually currently been a correction.
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The memorial there, handled by Belgroves Group of Companies, when brought the name Joan Francis. After the findings were given its attention, the memorial was upgraded to get rid of Joan Francis and consist of Joyce Cummings.
One memorial has actually been fixed, however the other stays the same.
Richard Charan can be called at [email protected]
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