Cop Dad says: ‘He got killed just so’

SEON ANDREWS, who was killed in an accident in Brooklyn, New York, on Christmas Day, was a sharp shooter with a bright future in the Trinidad and Tobago Defence Force. He was an assistant electrician with the Coast Guard based at Hart’s Cut, Chaguaramas. He joined the Coast Guard in January 1997 and “was aiming for the sky,” according to his father Carlton Andrews, a policeman attached to the Western Division. Andrews yesterday described his son as “a very obedient and good man.” He said he knew his son had goals in life, but they never discussed them. “But I can tell you he was aiming for the sky, but I can’t say what.” Since the death of his son, Andrews said he has been crying day and night. “One day he left me to go away, then he got killed just so. Imagine Christmas morning, I in a parang band and they come and tell me around seven in the morning that my son dead in an accident. I still searching for answers to that accident,” Andrews told Newsday from his La Horquetta home yesterday.
  
Andrews said Seon loved music and lived life. He loved to party and attend concerts. Andrews said Seon left Trinidad on December 21 to spend Christmas with one of his sisters Alana in Brooklyn. He said this was Seon’s second visit to the Big Apple where he was supposed to stay for a month. Andrews who has been in the Police Service for the past 29 years, said Seon’s body will return home tonight after an autopsy in New York. Seon, who would have been 26 on February 7, had four brothers including a twin Sean, Al, Selvon and Clinton. He had four sisters — Jillian, Rhonda (Texas), Alana (Brooklyn) and Aliah. Andrews said since the death of his son, the Coast Guard has been very supportive. “They have been 100 percent, I can’t complain about that. They have been around to give us support.” Seon will be afforded a full military funeral on Tuesday from the St Agnes Anglican Church, St James, to the Military Cemetery, Long Circular Road, St James.

Seon met his death on Christmas morning. An Army soldier,  home from Iraq for Christmas was the driver of the car in which Seon was killed. The accident occurred when a drunken driver plowed through a red light in Brooklyn and rammed his truck, cops said. The impact sent Durham’s Ford truck barreling into a Long Island Rail Road bridge stanchion, killing Andrews. The driver of the other car, Fritz Elysee, 31, of Brooklyn was reportedly drunk behind the wheel, police said. Elysee, who was at Kings County Hospital in critical but stable condition, was charged with driving while intoxicated (DWI) as prosecutors weighed heavier charges. Durham’s blood tested positive for alcohol, cops said, so he also was charged with driving-while-intoxicated.

Durham, a career military man stationed at an Army base in Georgia since returning from Iraq, arrived at his father’s Brooklyn home for the holidays three days ago. The 25-year-old soldier spent Christmas Eve with some friends, and was driving home when the holiday horror unfolded at about 4.30 a.m. Durham’s 2001 Ford carried six passengers as he drove west on Atlantic Avenue. Elysee was heading south on Nostrand Avenue, in a black Nissan and drove through a red light, ramming Durham’s truck and another car, cops said. Andrews was pronounced dead at St John’s Episcopal Hospital. Durham was treated for minor injuries; the driver of the third car was relatively unscathed.