Villagers protest; roadblocks erected
Tensions have risen again at Buxton, East Coast Demerara (ECD), following the early morning shooting of a villager, who was dragged from his bed along with his wife and child yesterday, by members of the ‘Black Clothes’ police.
Angry residents protested early yesterday morning after the police shot Shaka Blair in his home, after forcing their way into the house at Lot 42 Section ‘B’ Middle Walk, Buxton, shortly after midnight. Blair, 32, was pronounced dead on arrival at the Georgetown Public Hospital.
A release from the police yesterday stated that investigations have commenced into the circumstances surrounding the death of Blair at around 1:00 am yesterday at the hands of a police party.
According to the release, the police party had gone to Blair’s Buxton home in an attempt to arrest him for questioning in connection with the recent spate of hijackings and robberies after his fingerprints had been found on vehicles hijacked by bandits, who used them to commit robberies.
The release said that based on photographs supplied, he had been identified by the victims as one of the bandits who had committed recent acts of robberies and other criminal activities including those on the night of April 1.
However, this has been disputed by his reputed wife, Susan Simi Ragnauth, who said that she and Blair had operated a bar and played his music set ‘Merciless’ at the Buxton Community Centre ground all day on Monday, leaving at 12:30 am on Tuesday. She said that Blair had been there throughout that time, except for a break of about half an hour at around 4:30 pm, when he had gone home to freshen up and collect some pieces for his music set.
Another resident, Orlando Skeete, who said he had assisted the couple at their drinks stand and had played the set while Blair had gone home to collect the other equipment, confirmed this.
The police release said that acting on information that the wanted man was at home, ranks visited his residence and attempted to arrest him. He refused to cooperate, the police said, and instead discharged a loaded firearm at ranks who were forced to take cover and return fire, resulting in Blair being struck. He was said to have been immediately taken to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead on arrival.
According to the police release, a .375 -Smith and Wesson Magnum revolver, a quantity of live ammunition and spent shells along with a live hand grenade had been recovered from the scene.
Ragnauth denied that her reputed husband had a gun much less a grenade.
Speaking with Stabroek News yesterday, Ragnauth stated that the couple had retired to bed when they heard loud banging on the front door. Thinking that bandits were targeting them, she said, she immediately checked the time and rang the police at Vigilance East Coast Demerara, on their cordless telephone. She said she passed the phone to her husband and he was speaking with the police, when officers from the Anti-Crime Unit burst into their bedroom.
She said that they took her and their two-year-old son into a rear bedroom, which was occupied by her seven-year-old son, who had heard the noise and was sitting up in bed crying. She said that as she was being taken to the room she saw a member of the police party, whom she knew, and called out to him, asking what was happening. He did not reply.
Once in the rear bedroom, Ragnauth said, she was ordered to lie on the floor, face down. When she pleaded to speak, she was told to be quiet or risk being shot, so she complied, hugging her children. She said the two officers who watched over them had weapons trained on their backs.
She said she heard a shot ring out in their living room, and her husband cry out, “Oh God!” Next, she said, one of the officers shouted out “hospital” and one of the two in the bedroom guarding them said “movements.” It was after the two left the bedroom that she heard two shots ring out. Two holes were clearly visible in one of the wooden beams at the top of the living room wall yesterday.
According to Ragnauth, she was neither questioned nor told anything by the police, even as they dragged her husband away; nor did they search their home as she would have expected them to do.
The visibly shaken woman, who viewed the killing of her husband as cold-blooded murder, said the incident might have stemmed from a report made about her husband being involved in post elections violence, which she dismissed as highly unlikely in view of her ethnicity and the fact that she resided in Buxton.
Relatives of Blair, with whom this newspaper spoke also contradicted the police’s version of events. According to the eldest brother of the deceased, Dave Blair, who resides in a room on the lower flat of the home, he was asleep when he heard a loud banging on the door to the upper flat of the home, where his brother resided with his wife and children.
Blair said he heard his brother enquire who it was, but the response was a demand that he open his front door. It was after he began shouting “thief’ and “murder,” that he was told that it was the police, but by that time they were already in the house. During this time several armed ranks were seen standing at strategic points in the yard.
After gaining access to the bedroom, Blair said, he heard the sounds of the officers hitting his brother, after they had moved his wife and child. Shortly afterwards, he heard a shot ring out and then one of the officers asked his brother where the grenade was. He said he also heard one of the officers remark that it was time for hospital, after which he saw them drag his brother by the foot of his pants down the front stairs. Loading him into one of their vehicles, he said, they sped away down the Embankment Road in the direction of the city.
The deceased’s sister, Rudo Blair, who resides next door, said she too had heard the banging and looked out of a window. From that vantage point, she said, she saw through the open front door the police shoot her brother in the region of his chest, after which he crouched over, clutching it. They then dragged him by his pants down the front stairs.
According to the sister, about seven ranks were in the house, which she could clearly see as the front light was on.
Meanwhile, villagers, in anger over the shooting, dug up a section of the Embankment Road a short distance from Company Road and also placed various items of debris to block it.
This newspaper also saw a sprinkling of villagers milling around along the Embankment Road, discussing the incident.
According to the Neighbourhood Democratic Council Chairman, Randolph Blair, villagers had rung bells and beaten drums to awaken the community, alerting them to what had happened. Many came out and participated in demonstrations to vent their feelings.
Blair, a relative of the deceased, stated that the entire village was traumatized by the early morning events, which he said gave the impression that the police were deliberately targeting Buxton.
Another resident who resides in the area stated that she was in a shop at the front of the yard when the vehicles – a white pick-up, a blue jeep and a white car turned into the street and officers jumped the front gate and marched up the stairs of the deceased’s home. According to the resident, the officers had picked a quiet night in the village, and things might have been different had people been awake.
Several prominent officials including Region Four (Demerara/Mahaica)Chairman, Allan Munroe and Attorney-at-Law and PNC/R Executive Member, Raphael Trotman visited the area yesterday. Munroe expressed his concern over the incident.
When this newspaper arrived in the village yesterday morning armed ranks of the Tactical Services Unit and the Anti-Crime Unit were keeping an eye on traffic and guarding strategic points along the ECD main road. They were not visible on the Embankment throughway.
Village elder Eusi Kwayana, in a personal statement issued yesterday, dismissed as “a clumsy fiction not to be entertained” the reports that Shaka Blair had been armed. The claim of his involvement in any Easter Monday robbery was a falsehood, Kwayana said, noting that the young man was not in hiding but rather engaging in his business venture.
He viewed the early morning events as being deliberately provoked by the Guyana Police Force essentially the ‘Black Clothes; He was also critical of reports aired on GTV 11 which, he said, reported without actually visiting the scene of the shooting. |
Meanwhile, a later release from the force yesterday said that the police were investigating several incidents, which had occurred early yesterday morning in the vicinity of Buxton.
According to the release, vehicles were set upon and damaged while traversing the Embankment Road in the village, and it required police action to disperse the crowds and ensure the free flow of traffic.
The release said that a mob on the Embankment Road had stopped a vehicle proceeding east along that road and had stoned it resulting in the driver receiving serious injuries and needing hospitalization.
Since the perpetration of these unlawful acts, the police release continued, reinforcements from the city had been able to maintain law and order in the area and were conducting mobile patrols.
The release called on residents of Buxton to dissociate themselves from criminal elements while adopting lawful means of addressing perceived problems. It said the police were monitoring the situation and that all necessary steps would be taken to ensure that law and order prevailed.
At about 5:30 pm yesterday, the police had set up a roadblock on the Embankment Road, at Lusignan, and were stopping vehicles from proceeding east.
