Two days after he was arrested for a robbery and then rearrested after escaping from custody, the relatives of a Bartica youth are alleging he was beaten by the police and are calling on the Acting Commissioner of Police to investigate.
A video showing an injured Terrence McKenzie lying in the Bartica hospital nursing injuries to his face, back, legs and hands was being circulated yesterday by relatives who said the public needed to know what the police had done to the 18-year-old.
They are alleging that excessive force was used on McKenzie twice while he was in police custody and that on the last occasion he was knocked unconscious.
They claimed he was beaten shortly after the initial arrest and again when he was recaptured. According to relatives a team of six policemen at Bartica took turns beating him during the first thrashing while the second one allegedly involved a cutlass.
McKenzie who was treated at the Bartica hospital before being referred to the city is at present in the Brickdam lock-ups and is expected to pass through court tomorrow for his alleged involvement in the $1.7M robbery at the Bartica mall back in September.
Fighting to control his emotions, Errol Stuart told Sunday Stabroek yesterday that his grandson had been unconscious for over six hours after the second beating. He said the police had denied using excessive force but persons in the area who witnessed the second beating had spoken openly about the cutlass that was used.
Stabroek News contacted Police Public Relations Officer, Ivelaw Whittaker about the incident yesterday. He said his office had no knowledge of it and that he would first have to be briefed before responding.
Whittaker said he would check on the information provided and advised the newspaper to call back. The police PRO later said that he had been unable to make contact with the relevant persons to provide a response.
This newspaper later telephoned the Bartica police station and an officer who declined to give his name said the incident had not occurred in the way the family was claiming. The officer did not deny the beating and said that the police were merely doing their job though he would not elaborate on what he meant by this. Additionally, the officer said that McKenzie was a known character in the area.
Stuart said his grandson was currently in no condition to be lying on a prison bed without medical care and should be in hospital recuperating.
“A police at Brickdam told us to our face that Terrence should be in hospital and not at the station but didn’t see it fit to have him admitted.
He is in tremendous pain and many of his injuries are far from healed,” Stuart said.
Recounting what had led to McKenzie’s arrest, Stuart said his grandson had been accused of accepting stolen items from a friend who was on the mall robbery and allegedly had hidden them away. Recently a home in the area was broken into and McKenzie was fingered in the burglary. Though he was not wanted for questioning McKenzie had gone to the police on Tuesday to clear his name and had been held for the mall robbery.
The stolen items – mostly cellular phones and watches – were recovered on Thursday, and the proprietress of the store in the mall had been contacted.
According to Stuart the woman said she wanted no police story since her items had been found.
But the police took the young man to the station and allegedly gave him a severe beating. While he was receiving the blows McKenzie managed to slip away and fled the station. He ran two avenues away before he was recaptured.
The grandfather said when the police caught up with him he was handed a public beating on the streets with a cutlass in full view of many persons.
During the beating he was knocked unconscious and was later taken to the Bartica hospital.
While he was a patient at the hospital the family called in a reporter in the area to film McKenzie’s condition.
Stuart said his grandson was unconscious when the family went to visit him but he later regained consciousness. He said the doctor at Bartica referred the young man to the city saying he was in need of critical care.
According to Stuart, McKenzie followed “wrong company” and ended up in trouble with the law.
However he attributed this to the young man not being able to complete his schooling due to difficult circumstances in the family. He said McKenzie did not deserve the kind of treatment meted out to him by the police.
“We are not happy and we will fight this until justice is served.
They locked him and beat him mercilessly, so why should we be quiet about it?”
Stuart said the family had retained a lawyer yesterday and that counsel had already visited McKenzie at the police station.
