Baptist mother’s head bashed in

Residents of Railway Road, Siparia, were up to late yesterday trying to come to terms with the gruesome death of village matriarch Mother Ann Ivy Corrion, whose bloodied body was found with her entire face and head bashed in.

Eyewitnesses told Sunday Newsday the suspect used a large boulder to kill the woman who, a few months ago, had welcomed him into her home.

The killer also reportedly drank Corrion’s blood and the blood of a neighbour’s fowl cock, which he killed before fatally attacking the elderly woman. Police said he also killed Corrion’s pet parrot when he apparently ran amok. The suspect, police added, recently made a failed attempt to burn down the victim’s house. According to a police report, the incident occurred at about 8 am yesterday.

Carrion was killed in the gallery of her home, in the full view of several neighbours who looked on in horror. Corrion owned the Antoine Trace Spiritual Baptist Church, located at Quarry Village, Siparia. The suspect, 26, of Third Company, Indian Walk Road, Princes Town, later surrendered himself to police.

Eyewitnesses recalled how the suspect drank Corrion’s blood and threw pieces of her skull and brain at villagers when they tried to disarm him. He bashed her head several times against a concrete bannister. The suspect then went into the house and returned with several $100 bills which he tore up and began eating. Young men in the area told Sunday Newsday that they stoned him, but the suspect then pelted them with “pieces of skull and brains.”

After he had committed the ghastly act of killing Carrion, neighbours said, the suspect sat on the steps of the woman’s house and when police officers arrived on the scene, he pushed his hands forward to be handcuffed. When the suspect was handcuffed and placed in the police van, he slipped into the driver’s seat and made an attempt to drive the vehicle. He was quickly restrained by police officers.

Corrion’s killing took the toll to 228.

When Sunday Newsday arrived, officers of the Crime Scene Unit were collecting pieces of flesh and brain tissue, which were strewn about the woman’s yard.

Corrion, villagers said, emigrated to Trinidad many years ago from her native Grenada and settled in Siparia. She “adopted” several children, among them late world boxing champ Giselle Salandy, who lived with her for several years. Corrion was the mother of two adults, among them a son who is a senior police officer in Grenada. She also had several grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Hours before the suspect ran amok, Sunday Newsday was told he tried to abduct a five- year-old male relative of his common-law wife. The boy, however, was rescued by his grandmother. On Friday at about 5 pm, the suspect was also seen walking naked in the area armed with a cutlass. The suspect had moved out of the area four months ago.

Corrion’s niece-in-law, Louise Thomas, 54, who lives on the same compound, said the suspect shared a close relationship with one of her relatives. She said they spent four years living with her until she put him out.

Thomas said, “He and my daughter moved out of my home about four months ago and went back to Princes Town to live. I never saw him again until yesterday (Friday). He come in my house and I tell him to leave. He had a cutlass and he chop up my water tank. He wanted to chop a goat that was grazing.”

Thomas said the suspect entered her house and grabbed her five-year-old grandson Kelon.

She continued, “He said Kelon is his godson and he wanted to take him upstairs to Ivy. I had to grab the child and run.”

Thomas said although she knew the suspect for years, it was only recently he began acting strangely.

On Friday, Thomas said she tried praying with him, but he walked away.

Thomas lived in a house located at the back of the two-storey house where Corrion resided. The woman said when she awoke at 6 am, she walked outside and saw the suspect in Corrion’s gallery with a stone in his hand.

“I went up the step and he had a big stone in his hand. He was standing over Ivy, pounding away at her head and making strange noises. When he realised I watching him, he opened his eyes big and I just jump over the bannister and run. He was pelting the lady brain and skull all over the yard. Blood was dripping from his mouth.”

Thomas said she fell about six times running to the police station, located on High Street, for help.

Another of Corrion’s neighbours, Whitney Edmund, 22, recalled seeing the suspect hit the woman in her head with the stone.

“And he just kept bashing in her head until her face was gone. People just had to run to safety. He pull out the fowl neck, he kill the parrot and then sat talking to himself,” Edmund said.

Edmund said on Friday, she called the police but they never came.

“I called again yesterday morning while he killing the woman, but the officer said they were hearing noise so it could be a hoax. The noise was coming from scared neighbours.”

Corrion’s adopted son, Joel Eligon, said she was the only mother he knew, as she ‘adopted’ him from the age of two.

Eligon said, “It is a big loss not only for me, but plenty people across the world, as she had friends all over.”

In April 19, 2011, church member Roland Pollidore, 41, who lived at Corrion’s home, was found hanging in a room in the house. An autopsy revealed he committed suicide.

A party of police officers led by Insp Seedarie, visited the scene. Investigations are continuing.