Man almost loses life defending neighbour’s house

WHEN 54-year-old Sonnylal Sookhai was left in charge of his neighbour’s California home, he vowed to defend the property at all costs. During the early morning hours Friday, Sookhai’s vow almost cost him his life. Sookhai confronted an intruder around 1 am  in the shed of his neighbour Katisha Mohammed’s property and went after him with a cutlass. The intruder smash-ed a louvre pane in Sookhai’s face, resulting in deep gashes. The intruder panicked and ran off when Sookhai started scream-ing. Neighbours who heard Sookhai’s screams for help saw the intruder running off and gave chase, but he managed to escape.

Recalling his brush with death, Sookhai told Sunday Newsday, “I was asleep when I heard dogs barking. From the sounds, it look like the dog ‘Spotty,’ was trying to bite someone.” Sookhai armed himself with a cutlass, which he kept near his bed, and while walking towards the front door, he heard footsteps coming from a shed to the back of Moham-med’s house. “I gone brave up-stairs and when I reached in the bedroom, I saw two or three louvres missing from the window. I saw a man’s shadow by the shed and I took the cutlass and fire a chop through the window,” Sookhai ex-plained. He said the intruder who ducked as he fired the chop and smashed a louvre pane to his face. “I started to scream but by the time neighbours came, the man had ran off,” Sookhai said. He told Sunday Newsday that he had been a caretaker to Mohammed’s house for the past 15 years, whenever she left.