One charged with attempted murder
An 18-year-old university student from Berbice narrowly escaped being raped and murdered by two attackers last week but has lost her thumb in the process. One man has since been charged with attempted murder.
The incident, which occurred around 8:30 pm as the student was returning home from a stationery store at Port Mourant, Corentyne has left her deeply traumatized. The teen received seven stitches to her head and 43 to her hand.
One of the alleged attackers, Devindra Thomas of Swamp Section, Rose Hall Town, said to be in his late teens, was charged with attempted murder at the Whim Court on Monday. He was not required to plead and was refused bail. Magistrate Chandra Sohan adjourned the matter for September 30.
Thomas was captured during a search a few hours after the incident while his accomplice is still at large. The two pounced on her and one started to touch her buttocks. In retaliation, she shouted, “What is wrong with you? Go along your bloody way!”
At this stage one jumped off a bicycle they were riding and said “you can’t talk to me like that, me a gangster.” She told Stabroek News that the next thing she knew one of the attackers grabbed her by the neck and “tried to wring it backwards to break it.”
She said she “tried to scream but no sound came out” as she struggled to break loose. Meanwhile the other attacker was grabbing at other parts of her body. She eventually managed to free herself from the grip and started to scream.
She said that by this time the attackers pulled out a cutlass and fired a chop to her head. They fired a second chop but this time she managed to “block the chop” with her left hand causing her thumb and index finger to be severed.
The student said she screamed and ran towards the stationery store while the man continued firing chops which narrowly missed the back of her neck.
She was rushed to the New Amsterdam hospital where she underwent emergency surgery. She was admitted to the institution for five days and plans to seek further treatment in Georgetown.
Efforts by the doctors to save her thumb proved futile. Another surgery was subsequently performed successfully to allow her other fingers to function normally.
She told this newspaper that robbery was not the motive as the attackers did not remove her Motorola A1200 cellular phone, cash and a gold ring she had in her possession.
