RELATIVES of kidnap victim Tricia Suryadevera are hoping they can be allowed to speak with her when next her kidnappers telephone them.
Hours after she was abducted from her business place at High Street, Princes Town, her captors called her father, Teeluck Shirkissoon, demanding $2 million for her safe return. The kidnappers also told relatives that they would be contacting them again today. Since the incident, the Shirkissoon family has been praying that Suryadevera would be released unharmed. The family has been receiving an outpouring of support and prayers from businessmen, Government officials and friends. Suryadevera was snatched by three masked gunmen who stormed her businessplace — Trinkets Ltd — early Monday morning. Her four employees were ordered to lie on the floor at the back of the building while the gunmen dragged her into a waiting B13 Sentra. Members of the Anti-Kidnapping Squad (AKS) are continuing investigations.

NORMAL heavy morning traffic along the Cross Crossing Inter-change in San Fernando was made worse yesterday when a  PTSC bus, transporting 22 passengers from Port-of-Spain to San Fernando, caught fire yesterday. However, fortunately for bus driver John Flemming and his passengers, no one was injured in the incident. Police sources told Newsday the fire originated from the engine which is located at the back of the bus. The drama unfolded around 8.15 am when passengers at the rear of the bus alerted Flemming that they smelled smoke. Flemming pulled to the side of the road and as he was ushering out his passengers, the bus caught fire.

Firemen from the nearby Mon Repos Fire Station responded and were able to extinguish the flames before it spread to the entire bus. The engine and a few seats at the back of the bus were destroyed. The back glass was shattered due to the intense heat. Shortly after being informed about the fire, PTSC officials dispatched another bus to pick up and transport the stranded passengers to their destinations. Investigations are continuing.

JUSTICE Herbert Volney yesterday found no validity in an application by the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) to indict a 55-year-old woman and her three daughters for wounding a Couva man — an incident in which the mother and her daughters served varying jail sentences for killing the man’s mother. After delivering a written judgment in the San Fernando First Assizes, Justice Volney set free the mother, Dianne Davies, and her daughters, Marika, 25, Dimisha, 24, and Sascha, 22. Justice Volney stated that the powers of the DPP “was neither absolute nor exercisable capriciously but in accordance with settled practice and recognisable juridical constraints.”

In 1999, Davies and her daughters were tried for murdering Sheriffa Ali on January 23, 1997, and pleaded guilty to the lesser count of manslaughter. Trial judge Justice Kenny Persad imposed varying sentences, with daughter Sascha serving four years and Dianne and the other daughters serving three. However, almost a year ago while serving the last month of the sentence, the mother and her daughters were served with notices by the DPP to answer charges of wounding Dexter Ali. The stabbing of Ali arose out of an incident in which the mother and her three daughters killed Ali’s mother, Sheriffa. The State sought to now prosecute the mother and her daughters for wounding Ali because State attorneys said  it was an “oversight” that the four women were not previously given the opportunity to plea to the lesser offence of wounding. Attorney Prakash Ramadhar, representing the mother and her daughters, previously contended that it was an abuse of process to further prosecute the women.

The wounding charge which the DPP is seeking to have them indicted, Ramadhar submitted, arose out of the killing incident for which the mother and her daughters have already been sentenced, and it is an abuse of process to further prosecute. Justice Volney respon-ded  yesterday: “It is here that learned counsel for the accused has with great industry canvassed the submission that the DPP has crossed the line, acted capriciously and filed an indictment that is both irregular as being unsupported at law, and certainly, as abuse of process of the Court.”

ONE OF the four policemen currently under investigation in connection with the death of 23-year-old Shaun McLeod, who died while in police custody two weeks ago, was scheduled to be placed on an identification parade at the Marabella Police Station yesterday afternoon. According to an autopsy, McLeod died from blunt force trauma to the head. He had been arrested by police for using obscene language at Library Corner, San Fernando. McLeod, reports revealed, collapsed while in police custody and was already dead when he arrived at the San Fernando General Hospital in the police vehicle.

The police fingered in McLeod’s strange death, have claimed that he collapsed while at the station. Relatives said when they went to the mortuary they saw a tag on his toe which listed preliminary cause of death as a drug overdose. Senior officers of the San Fernando Homicide Bureau have since been detailed by Acting Commissioner of Police Everald Snaggs to conduct a full scale investigation into the incident. The Ag CoP received the file last week but returned it to the Homicide Bureau to be completed. The updated file is yet to be returned to the Acting Commissioner.

THE OPPOSITION United National Congress (UNC) yesterday alleged that the media is siding with the Government to “play down the reporting of crime and criminal activities now plaguing the country.” In a statement, the UNC said: “Since PNM Crime Committee Chairman Ken Gordon met with media bosses last month, crime and criminal activities were taken off the front pages of the newspapers. The media no longer provide information to the public on the number of murders and kidnappings committed. This is creating a false sense of security which seems to have influenced Prime Minister Patrick Manning in making the foolish statement that Trinidad and Tobago is a safe place and that the average citizen feels safe.”

However the UNC claimed that this “Government-influenced censorship of the news has not kept the spate of murders and kidnappings down” and just as Opposition Leader Basdeo Panday predicted, “The murder rate will cross the 200 figure by year’s end. “We are reliably informed that within a 72-hour period last week, there were 30 attempted kidnappings. Our information is that the murder rate now stands at 163, just nine short of last year’s total of 172,” the party declared. The UNC added that the media’s silence on crime is “yet another attempt by the media to be soft on the PNM Government and being part of the Government’s PR machinery. “The media must be free and unfettered. It must continue to hold the PNM Government to scrutiny, just as it did when the UNC was in office. The media must cease to be the cheerleader and choir-boy of the PNM,” the UNC said. Meanwhile, Opposition Chief Whip Ganga Singh described a threatening TSTT text message over the weekend as a “breach of national security” and an act of “cyber terrorism.” He called upon the Government to bring in US and British counter-terrorism experts to help police “bring this matter to a speedy resolution.”

The various Ramleela groups have been given $300,000 to carry on this year’s programme. This according to the Minister of Culture and Tourism, Pennelope Beckles as she addressed the prize giving function of the Tassa Association of TT (TATT)  held at the Central Indoor Sports Arena, Saith Park, Chaguanas, Tuesday evening. Beckles also promised financial support to TATT for the 2004 competition. She apologised on behalf of her ministry for not offering financial support this year, saying that she was not aware of this year’s competition. She also made the announcement that her ministry will be hosting a grand Divali presentation at Brian Lara Promenade on October 22.

“We are going to light up the whole of the promenade. I believe that this venture will be a treat for the people from the north,” she said. She also noted that there would be a wide variety of vegetarian foods available from as early as 8 am, at the Divali celebration. “People can come in and have their doubles, saheeena and other delicacies on this day,” she told the audience. She then invited all the tassa enthusiasts to come out in their large numbers and assist in having this programme on the promenade. In talking about the tassa drums, she said that the drums speak a language of its own. “It casts a spell on the listener. The rhythms get to their hearts and soul and then they let loose to dance to the beat,” she said.
She also said that she acknowledged the fact that tassa was created in TT since 1850 and has grown tremendously not only in this country but it has been exported to many foreign countries. On TATT’s request for tassa to become the second national instrument, she promised to look into the matter.
 
Among the tassa groups collecting trophies and cheques at this function are: First place winner, Carib Asphalt’s St John’s Tassa Group who received $5,000. They also received a cheque for $2,500 for winning the Best Dressed Group. Members of the Tristar Tassa Group placed second winning $3,000. The Princes Town-based Caribel Fun Lovers placed third winning $2,000. Chairman of TATT, Vijai Rai, thanked the sponsored for supporting the tassa groups on the country. Sponsors of this year’s competition include. Newsday, NLCB, TIDCO, T&TEC, National Petroleum, Shanti’s Bar, Tracmac Engineering, National Flour Mills and Vicki’s Electronics. The National Tassa Champion, St John’s Tassa group provided entertainment for the audience.

Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, Wade Mark, is calling on Minister of Works and Transport, Franklyn Khan, to confirm that the MV Beauport and MV Panorama are properly insured and certified. He was addressing at a media conference at the Senate on Tuesday during the tea break. Mark disclosed that his research had been unable to confirm the recent statement of the Port Authority that the two Tobago ferries Panorama were both insured with Lloyds of London. “It seems there’s a gag. Lloyds is not releasing any information.” He said he hadn’t been able to get any information on the insurance status of the Panorama. Mark distributed documents from Sweden dated September 12, 2003, which showed that the Beauport was in fact insured with the American Steamship Owner P & I Association. Asked if the Beauport could be insured with two insurers, Opposition Senator Sadiq Baksh ventured that maybe the vessel operators had to settle for a less renowned insurer than Lloyds until any possible deficiencies were corrected.

Mark also revealed that many inspections of various sections of the Beauport were actually now overdue. These included inspections of its hull, machinery, marpol compliance and load line despite the fact that a current Passenger Ship Safety Certificate had been issued. Saying the Opposition’s sole concern was for the safety of passengers travelling between Port-of-Spain and Scarborough, Mark said: “We are saying to Franklyn Khan, we want to hear from you. We want a categorical statement that the vessels are properly insured and that all aspects of their operation have been properly certified.”