FIVE INFANTS were among 16 persons left homeless yesterday when their St Ann’s home was destroyed by fire. According to reports, members of the Thomas family were at their Ariapita Road home around noon, watching a soap opera. Reports indicate that an alarm was raised by a young female relative who suddenly yelled “fire.” By the time, the family rushed out the front of the building, the rear was completely engulfed in flames. The family was able to save only one chair and a few items from the raging inferno and have no idea where they will stay. The family is appealing to members of the public for help.
Quick response by officers of the Maloney Police Station yesterday resulted in the arrest of two robbery suspects, the seizure of a sawed off shotgun, several cartridges, and money and jewelry which had earlier been stolen from the proprietress of a paint shop. Reports are that around 2.30 pm, Shaliza Mohammed was at Shell Paint Shop, Piarco Old Road, when she was confronted by two men, one armed with a sawed off shotgun. Mohammed was ordered to hand over a quantity of cash and jewelry and the bandits fled the scene on foot. A report was made to the Emergency-999 and officers of the Maloney Police Post led by Sgt Godson Andrews and including Cpl Gray and others responded.
The two suspects were held in bushes at Maloney allegedly counting the cash. Officers also seized a sawed off shotgun and cartridges. The two suspects were taken to the Maloney Police Post and later handed over to officers of the Arima Police Station. The victim was called to the Arima Police Station where she identified the two suspects, ages 19 and 23. Newsday learned that the two suspects will be placed on identification parades for similar offences in the Northern Division. Yesterday, ACP Crime Oswyn Allard was high in praise of the quick response by the police officers which led to the arrests, the recovery of the stolen items and the seizure of the sawed off shotgun. The gun will be sent to the Forensic Science Centre for tests to be carried out by a ballistic expert to determine if the weapon had been used in any recent shootings and murders. Cpl Gray of the Maloney Police Post is investigating.
Mothers in Tobago are literally crying out over the length of time it takes to execute warrants for outstanding child maintenance payments, commonly referred to as “maintenance” warrants. The affected mothers are appealing to the authorities to do something urgently to address this vexing situation. The child maintenance payments are ordered by the Magistrates’ courts after a hearing in situations where mothers claim that the children’s fathers are not financially supporting their children. In cases where the court orders a father to make such payments on a weekly, fortnightly or monthly basis, and he fails to do so, the mother then signs a warrant for his arrest.
When the warrant is executed, he is arrested and then taken before the court where he is ordered to make a lump sum payment of the outstanding payments, or serve a period of simple imprisonment. The problem, according to the aggrieved mothers, is that it takes a very long time for these warrants to be executed by the police. What this means is that these mothers keep going to court time after time and are told that the delinquent fathers cannot be located by the policeman responsible for executing the warrant. One such mother complained to Newsday yesterday that she had ‘signed’ a warrant on June 6 for the arrest of a man who owed child maintenance payments amounting to $800. To date, the errant father has not been arrested. She said she was told by police that they could not locate the man. “But the man is working in Scarborough. He is all over town,” the woman claimed.
The mother, who asked that her identity and that of the child’s father be withheld, told Newsday that the situation is further compounded by the fact that the man, perhaps out of spite, has not made any payments to the court since she ‘signed’ the warrant for his arrest. Meantime, she claimed, “The child is suffering, and school is opening just now,” she lamented. It was pointed out that this was just one of a number of such cases in which mothers are left virtually powerless in collecting child maintenance payments ordered by the courts. In most cases, the affected mothers allege that there seems to be some sort of collusion between the delinquent fathers and the warrant officers. Social services personnel on the island confirmed the situation, noting that they have had several complaints from aggrieved mothers. They, too, appealed to the authorities to do something about it.
The father of the two men accused of 22-year-old Andre Linsay’s murder appeared before a Justice of the Peace at the Port-of-Spain Magistrates’ Court after being charged jointly with his sons for the murder. Jimmy “Shabaaz” Bournes, 58, of Pelican Road Extension, Morvant, is accused along with his sons Akido Mayers, 23, URP labourer, and Nigel “Duffo” Mayers, 30, all of the same address of the April 22 stabbing murder. All three are represented by attorney Joseph Melville.
Linsay, of Pump Trace, Laventille, was reportedly at the National Housing Authority office at Lady Young Avenue, Port-of-Spain when he was approached by a group of men and stabbed several times about the body. The charge was laid indictably by Sgt Dave Hilaire of the Morvant CID. Bournes is expected to appear in Court today before Chief Magistrate Sherman Mc Nicolls. Nigel Mayers, who was also charged with assaulting a police officer during a fracas at the Court last Monday, re-appeared on the charge yesterday. Mayers informed Magistrate David Harris that he was assaulted by a police officer in the incident and wished to bring a charge against him. The magistrate told the man that he should pursue the matter with the assistance of his attorney. The matter was adjourned to next Thursday.
CONFLICTING reports on the events leading up to the death of a 32-year-old Siparia man have both police investigators and the deceased’s relatives waiting on the results of an autopsy, which was supposed to have been carried out yesterday evening. What is known is that Sherman Thompson, a mechanic of Quarry Village, was bathing with friends at Los Iros Beach around 4.45 pm on Sunday when he got into difficulties and disappeared under the water. Reports from the Erin police indicate that after several minutes, Thompson resurfaced and was pulled out of the sea.
Police said persons on the shore rushed to Thompson’s side and quickly attempted cardio pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) but without success. However, accounts from a witness indictate that it was a higly intoxicated Thompson who was frolicking in the waves. Kevon Rama, a friend of the deceased, said Thompson was “throwing himself in the water and on people”. According to Rama, Thompson had walked out of the water towards the shore where he (Rama) noticed Thompson clutching his chest as if in pain. Rama said Thompson collapsed on the sand and died. At the home of the deceased, Thompson’s relatives refused to be interviewed by Newsday yesterday. PC Bhajnath of the Erin police Station is continuing investigations.
THE acting CEO of the now defunct Caroni (1975) Limited Chandra Bobart was called out to placate daily paid employees of the former sugar company yesterday at the Company’s Brechin Castle compound after workers discovered several “unexplained” deductions in their pay-slips. Bobart, who was forced to address workers while standing on a chair, said several “adjustments” in salary slips for daily paid workers had not been properly identified. He promised that the Company would clear up all queries by Friday. Bobart said while workers had been told to contact the Company’s Information Services Department (ISD) for further information, he noted that Credit Union deductions had not been properly marked on pay-slips.
Workers had been complaining of mysterious deductions after receiving their final salary slips at the Company’s offices last Friday. Several employees also pointed out that payment for unused vacation time had also been “cut” by the Company without any explanation. And, in answer to another query, Bobart said that the Company was still awaiting word from the National Insurance Board on when the final payments could be made to its former monthly paid staff.
Four iguanas, which a Tobago woman said were “left back” in her deep freeze (refrigerator) following a harvest festival last April, yesterday cost her $1,000 in the Scarborough Magistrates’ Court. The fine was imposed on Wendy DesVignes by Second Court Magistrate Halcyon Yorke-Young after she admitted to having the iguanas, a much sought-after delicacy especially at the popular Harvest event in the island. Des Vignes, of Goodwood, east Tobago, made an immediate ‘downpayment’ of $200 and was given three weeks to pay the rest, failing which she would have to serve three months’ immprisonment with hard labour. “I had them there since April when the season was open; I didn’t know there was any trouble in that,” she told the magistrate. “It’s not included in the list of animals so it is a protected animal. The offence is not when you got it but having it in your possession,” the magistrate explained.
DesVignes was charged by Det PC Andy Cunningham with having protected animals in her possession contrary to the Protection and Conservation of Wildlife Act. Prosecutor Sgt Neil Adams told the court that Cunningham and other officers executed a search warrant for dangerous drugs at DesVignes’ home around 3.30 pm last Thursday. No illegal drugs were found, but Cunningham found and seized the four frozen iguanas.
THE wife of a man who was reportedly killed during a shoot-out with the Southern Division Crime Suppression Unit (CSU) has sought assistance from the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), as she seeks answers for her husband’s death. Wendy-Ann Gomes visited Newsday’s South Bureau office yesterday to say she had taken the matter to the Acting Assistant DPP, Joan Honore-Paul. Gomes, 31, whose husband Miguel ‘Goat’ Williams was shot to death by police two weeks ago in Macaulay Lands, Claxton Bay, believes he was executed by the police. Gomes said she first went to Honore-Paul last Wednesday to get assistance in the matter of her husband’s death. She said she spoke to Paul on Thursday and met her again yesterday.
Gomes said that Honore-Paul was in the process of obtaining both the files from the police and the death certificate, to review the results of the autopsy. Gomes, now the single mother of seven children whose ages range from two months to 15 years, said the DPP’s office may be her last means of getting answers on her husband’s death. “If I realise I can’t get anywhere, then I might have to leave it just so,” she said. Gomes said there were too many unanswered questions surrounding the circumstances of her husband’s death. She is questioning the fact that despite official police reports that Williams was shot while running away, the autopsy showed that he had been shot multiple times to the front of his body. Gomes said she witnessed the autopsy and claimed her husband was shot more than 20 times. The woman also produced photos of her husband following the autopsy, to prove that he was shot in front.
According to police reports, Williams was a passenger in a car driving by a man who was driving into Macaulay Lands. At the time, CSU officers were conducting a road-block exercise and stopped the car when they realised it had no licence plates. Police claim Williams jumped out of the car, which quickly reversed and sped off, and opened fire at the police, who dived for cover and returned fire. The injured man was taken to the San Fernando General Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival. However, Gomes said the driver of the car spoke to her about the incident a few hours after Williams had died. The driver stated that while he was driving along the road, a police car pulled across the road in front of the vehicle, while a police jeep pulled up to the back. Gomes said the driver told her that Williams panicked, opened the front door and ran into nearby canefields. The driver said that police came up to him and ordered him to continue driving. While driving away, the driver said he heard multiple gunshots. Gomes said anytime her children asked for their father, she keeps telling them he is in heaven. “No one should have to die like this,” Gomes said as she struggled to hold back tears. Checks with Southern Division police yesterday revealed that investigations were still on-going.
At the decrepit San Fernando Magistrates’ Court, disgust and disenchantment continued among support staff who returned to work yesterday after a no-show last Thursday and Friday to protest the unsanitary conditions under which they are forced to work. Now, policemen are adding to the complaints about the working conditions at the court. Yesterday, a filthy residue from the rotting roof dropped onto a desk in the First Court, preventing police complainants in several matters from sitting as they waited on their cases to be called. Attorney Chateram Sinanan, who is a regular at this courthouse, told Newsday, “The conditions at the San Fernando Court is probably the worst in the entire country. This is no exaggeration.” Sinanan added that he had worked at many courts in the country, but none are as bad as the San Fernando Magistrates’ Court.
Sinanan said he sympathised with the clerks who work in the lower section of the court. This department, he said, was sealed off so that air-conditioning units could be installed. However, to date, no units have been installed. Last week, President of the Magistrates Association of Trinidad and Tobago, Ag Snr Magistrate Ramraj Harripersad said the clerical workers protested the conditions because “they just could not take it anymore.” On a daily basis some notetakers are forced to spray under their seats with insecticide to get rid of mosquitoes. None of the courts are air-conditioned. Grass can be seen growing through some upper windows which are cracked, broken, discoloured and some even stained with moss. Heavy rain sometimes lead to a premature end to matters as leaking often occurs. Nine months ago, Attorney General Glenda Morean and Chief Magistrate Sherman Mc Nicolls toured the San Fernando courthouse and AG Morean promised to have the courts relocated while the current building was being renovated. A Committee headed by the Chief Administration officer of the Judiciary was appointed to take care of the relocation and refurbishing process. To this day, neither have courts been relocated nor has there been any refurbishing work done on the building.
OPPOSITION MP Gillian Lucky yesterday condemned National Security Minister Howard Chin Lee for not launching an immediate investigation into how bandits disguised as policemen robbed a Chaguanas gas station of $50,000. Addressing a post-PNM General Council news conference in San Fernando on Sunday, Chin Lee expressed “a measure of satisfaction” over the breakup of a major kidnapping ring in the country, but noted that “what is becoming obvious is that when we step down on one area of crime, criminals are looking at other areas.”
The minister urged the population against complacency despite the present “lull in kidnappings” and gave the assurance that the police were doing all in their power to ensure that the “business of kidnapping” was over. However, Lucky was shocked that Chin Lee could make such utterances mere hours after two gunmen dressed in police uniform robbed the 24-hour Plus Convenience Store at Medford’s Gas Station, Chaguanas. The UNC MP said the easy access which criminals appear to have to police uniforms, weapons and information is very worrying and Chin Lee continues “to bury his head in the sand” and has yet to fully comprehend “the culture of crime.” Lucky wondered whether this means members of the Police Service were actively involved in criminal activities and claimed that what Trinidad and Tobago was now witnessing was an apparent drop in kidnappings but an increase in serious crimes such as robbery.
Reiterating her call for Chin Lee’s resignation, Lucky declared: “He remains incompetent. He has shown that he has achieved nothing.” She claimed the minister was trying to fool the population into believing that he was getting tough on crime by helicopter tours and visiting police roadblocks throughout the country. The UNC MP said the grim reality was that criminals are unafraid of the police and the Government and there was now “a criminal fiesta” in Trinidad and Tobago.
