Linden utility co-op probes footballer’s death

The Linden Utilities Ser-vices Co-op Society Limited (LUSCSL) is investigating the death of footballer Troy `Kang’ Richards, who was electrocuted on Thursday night.
The Linden Electricity Company Inc. is also assisting the investigation.

Troy Richards
Troy Richards

While some residents suffered electrical shocks, 35-year-old Richards, who plays for the Silver Shattas Football Club, died shortly after 7 pm at his girlfriend’s house at 998 Blue Berry Hill. According to his girlfriend, Adjoua Duke, Richards died while unplugging her fridge.

Blue Berry Hill was experiencing electrical problems and the power was constantly on and off and at instances there was low voltage. Resi-dents said minutes before the incident they saw the earth wires to the home on fire. Homes were vibrating heavily from the humming of the electricity emanating form the power lines.

Manager of LUSCSL, Ms. Yangapatty, said after the incident the company launched a thorough investigation. “We are conducting investigations house-to-house to ascertain the direct cause of the electrical problems because the problem can be either from the house or the poles.” She said that last year the company did major maintenance in the area and was not aware of any other problem prior the recent incident.

However, during a revisit to the area yesterday several residents said that they have frequently complained to LUSCL about frequent low voltage but these fell on deaf ears. They said Thursday night’s experience was the worse ever.

Richards was preparing to represent his team in a major clash on Sunday, which was crucial to its qualifying for year-end Kashif and Shanghai Football Tourna-ment. (Cathy Wilson)