Arima nightclub owner shot dead

DAYS after he noticed a white Sunny motorcar following him, Arima businessman Patrick “Birdie” Fernandez was shot and killed on Tuesday night by occupants of the same vehicle on King Street, Arima, police said.

Fernandez, 38, of Carnelian Street, Bon Air West, Arouca, was the owner of the popular Fifth Element Club and Island Village, both located in Arima. However, while Fernandez noticed the strange vehicle, he never made a report to the police. However, in an effort to elude the occupants of the white vehicle, he gave other people his Honda Civic car to drive, while he drove other vehicles. However, the men in the white car caught up with Fernandez on Tuesday night around 8.30 pm while the businessman was proceeding south along King Street. He had just left Fifth Element and was heading for Island Village. Police said the vehicle pulled alongside Fernandez’s Honda Civic, in which there was another male occupant. The occupants of the white vehicle fired three shots on the driver’s side, smashing the window and striking Fernandez twice on the right side of his head and neck. The other man was not hurt. Fernandez, a father of three daughters, ages 15, 6 and 2, was rushed to the Arima Health Facility, but was pronounced dead on arrival. 

A party of officers under ASP Errol Dillon and including acting ASP Wesley Moore, Sgt Hendron Moses (Homicide) and Cpl Jones of the Arima CID visited the scene and seized three spent shells from the roadway. “He never believed he needed a bodyguard. He never took precautions,” the dead man’s brother, Christopher, told Newsday at the Forensic Science Centre yesterday.  Christopher said his brother, a former student of North Eastern College, Sangre Grande, did not even become fearful for his life after he was shot twice in the leg outside the Fifth Element Club on the morning of December 28, 2001. On that occasion, he was about to close the business place when a group of men reportedly came to rob him. They went up the stairs, but were told that the place was closed. The group came down the stairs then opened fire on a group which included Fernandez. Police sources said they could not come up with a clear motive for Fernandez’s killing, but said it was not drug-related. Lawmen said they did not think the two shootings were related. No one was at Fernandez’s sprawling pink house when Newsday visited yesterday. Guards were supposed to be posted from last evening at the house, which still had its outside lights on.

At the Forensic Science Centre, Christopher supported the police’s theory that the killing was not drug related.  “I could put my head on a block that his death had nothing to do with drugs,” Christopher said. He suggested it might have been triggered by jealousy since his brother was in the process of opening another business.  Christopher also told Newsday that Fernandez brought out a Carnival band in Arima this year. He described his brother as a well-loved person, who employed several youths at his business places. He doubted that any one of those youths were responsible for his brother’s killing. An autopsy by pathologist Dr Hughvon DesVignes revealed he died from gunshot wounds.  He is to be buried tomorrow following a funeral service at the Santa Rosa RC Church.