Dane fought and lost his life

Twelve-year-old Dane Andrews of New Grant lost his life because he fought back when a man tried to molest him. This was the view of his mother, Avril Andrews, a 35-year-old housewife who spoke with Sunday Newsday on Friday. She charged that there is a homosexual ring which has been operating in the area for about ten years and described that part of New Grant as an area of “high sexual activity among men”.  One of the ring leaders she said belonged to a homosexual gang that moved from Monkey Town a few years ago, but still lives in New Grant. Police are looking for three youths who they believe will have valuable information about what happened to Dane. The Andrews family lives at Mayaro/Naparima, in an area where three roads connect: Monkey Town 3rd Branch Road, Monkey Town 2nd Branch Road and Monkey Town 1st Branch Road. The area is thick with bush and is very isolated — an ideal setting for luring children for molestation and even death.

On the afternoon of Wednesday February 1 at about 3.40 pm, Dane left the New Grant Government School where he was a student with a classmate.  He did not go home but instead went to a neighbour’s house where the classmate later told police he loaned Dane a pair of short pants and they both went to a nearby field to suck sugar cane.  That cane field is about 100 feet from the classmate’s house. According to what the classmate said in an interview with the police, Dane then left with three young men to go to the “Gravel Pit” bay - which is a nearby pond.  The classmate was reluctant to go with them and that decision probably saved his life. In the meantime the classmate waited for Dane’s return but as it grew dark he became anxious as he had expected Dane to be back by then to collect his school things.

At about 7 o’clock the classmate went to Dane’s house to see if he had gone straight home and to drop off his school bag, uniform and books. But Dane had not returned home and his now anxious mother asked his uncle, Selwyn Dyer  and a group of friends to search for him.  At about 11 pm that night, Dyer found Dane’s underwear on the bank of a pond, said to be about 30 feet deep about a mile off Monkey Town Branch Road, New Grant. At about 9.30 am on Thursday, villagers, Dion Fortune, 24, and Dexter Williams, 35, found Dane’s body when a bamboo stick they were using to search for him in the pond, came into contact with the body.  An autopsy performed at the Forensic Sciences Centre revealed he died from asphyxiation due to drowning.  Shockingly, the autopsy also revealed Dane had been sexually assaulted. The family and neighbours were stunned.

It seemed uncomfortably to be a replay of the tragic events eight years ago when 11-year- old Akiel Chambers went to a swimming pool birthday party in  Haleland Park. He too failed to return home and was found the next day in the pool.  He too was dead and had been sexually assaulted. Rumours have continued to swirl around Akiel’s death and many believe there is a cover up both by the police and top people in the country who are simply not saying what they know.  Police investigations were poorly conducted and key evidence at the crime scene was either deliberately lost or disposed of.  To date no one has been brought to justice. The Andrews family however, swore at Dane’s funeral last week that it will not happen this time and Dane’s killer/s will be apprehended.

Speaking with Sunday Newsday, Avril Andrews  said that small children are being regularly molested.  She said most of the families who live there are single parents and children are not supervised most of the time. She said: “I believe that these homosexual men are using snacks as a means of luring the children into isolated areas. The children are raped and molested by these men who threaten to hurt them if they tell anyone.  Children are seen in the company of male adults in parlours all the time. “Villagers have been hearing about this homosexual ring for years but never had direct facts until my son turned up dead.  No one ever brought in the authorities to investigate or put a stop to these practices,” she said sadly. She called on the Government agencies to get involved and curb these activities. “If these men are HIV positive it is just a matter of time before all the youths in this area are infected and soon they will all die,” she said.

Andrews was shocked at the idea of homosexual behaviour in the neighbourhood, moreso when they attack young children. Another of Dane’s classmates was examined to see if he too was a victim, but he had not been sexually assaulted the examination showed. “There are so many beautiful women out there. God made man for woman not to be with the same sex. Because of what has happened to my son, fathers have chosen to walk their children to and from school. They are afraid of what is lurking in the bushes waiting for their children. “The adults need to open their eyes and accept that there is a homosexual ring in the area and they need to come out and say something before it gets even more out of hand.”

She said the homosexuals are bachelors and live with their mothers. Villagers in Monkey Town, she added live a secretive life. “Villagers marry villagers and that is how it goes,” she added. “This is the first time that Dane did not come home straight from school,” she said. “He would never had gone that treacherous route unless he went with someone that he knew. And it has to be someone who knows the area well.  But I believe that he was buggered somewhere else.  He put up a fight and was knocked out and then they dumped his body in the pond and he drowned.  If he fell into the pond the caimans would have eaten him.  I believe this was the first time he was sexually assaulted.  It must be because he never liked to be touched.  I wash his clothes, I would have known if he was being molested.”

“Even when I scolded him he would become frightened and say mummy I would never do that again.  He had a temper.  They picked on the wrong person and it ended in his death.  They killed him because he was fighting back.  He did not know that area at all.  He cannot swim, the first time he went to the beach was last year.  He cannot even climb a tree and to get to the pond, you have to climb over trees and jump over bushes.  When I saw his shoes the front, back and sides were burst like if someone forced it off his foot.  The police took that and his underwear.  But the boy he was with is the key to this whole mystery,” Andrews said.

Many villagers were very outspoken, but others were reluctant to comment. Several villagers along Monkey Town 3rd Branch Road confirmed that they had heard rumours about sexual activity and the existence of a  homosexual ring.  But up until Andrews death they had no proof.  One villager said most people in the area kept to themselves.  “It is safer for you if you do that.  It is not safe up here. That homosexual ring is true.  There is one particular homo who puts on make-up and wig.  Everyone here is very secretive. I try to keep to myself all the time.” When asked for directions to the pond, villagers expressed fear that the track was dangerous and lonely. They told us: “All sorts of things could be lurking in the bushes.  You should not go there.”

The house that Dane Andrews visited that fateful day is located almost a mile down a hill from the Naparima/Mayaro Main Road. The area is heavily forested. From there a  track leads  along an intersection at the bottom of Monkey Town 3rd Branch road. The track is about 100 feet from the house where Dane had changed his clothes, and 40 feet off the main road. The track starts from the edge of a drain, which passes through a cane field. The track is surrounded by large bushes and trees, and some areas along the pathway are blocked by fallen trees and tall bushes.

Ken Wilkinson, 19, who lives in the house where Dane went with his classmate after school had this to say: “The boy who came here with Dane does not live here. He lives with his mother in another house higher up the road. When she is working or has to go out, he stays here. I was not at home when the boys came from school as I was at work. But the boy told me that Dane came and changed into short pants. He said that they went to the cane field (where the tracks run) to cut and suck cane.” He said he was told that three other boys came and suggested that they go to the gravel pit (another pond) and Dane went along with them, but not his classmate. “When I came home that evening I saw Dane’s school uniform, bag and shoes in the gallery. I did not know it was Dane’s. Then my sister asked what had happened to Dane.

But all we knew was that Dane had not come back for his stuff. My uncle took the boy to his mother’s home with Dane’s stuff then they all went to Dane’s house. I don’t know what happened to Dane. I heard about the homosexuality but I don’t know anything about it. I live here with my 65-year-old grandmother, 15-year-old sister and 16-year-old brother. A woman takes care of my grandmother most of the time,” Wilkinson said. Will this be another Akiel Chambers story or have the police learnt from experience and will do a proper investigation of the Dane Andrews killing so that justice is done and another innocent child’s life has not been taken in vain? It is incredible that it was known that a homosexual ring was operating in the area and molesting young children, and no one did anything to stop it and that a 12-year-old boy should have paid with his life when he bravely tried to fight off his attackers.