Driving taxis especially at night, whether independently or with a service, remains a major risk and while many drivers try to screen their passengers or get off the road at a decent hour, many still fall victim to crime.
At least nine taxi drivers have been brutally killed by so-called passengers in the last three years and though many have put measures in place to secure themselves, some drivers and service operators believe that nothing absolutely guarantees their safety.
Dozens of taxis have been hijacked in the last few years and in several instances the drivers are injured or killed when they put up resistance. It is suspected that some of these vehicles are used in the commission of various crimes before being abandoned.
Police have done little to curb this phenomenon which engenders fear in those in this sector. Few of the perpetrators of this type of crime have been caught and prosecuted and some of the incidents have become cold cases. Stabroek News attempted to get a comment from the police during the last few days but was unsuccessful.
In April, 2006, the bullet-riddled body of Desmond Bentick, 24, of William Street, Kitty was found in ‘B’ Field Sophia. The private car he was driving was missing and was later found abandoned on the West Ruimveldt Front Road several days later. It is suspected that it was used in the commission of a robbery at Link Bar during which the owner was shot.
Reports at that time had indicated that the night before he was found, three men had hired him from Demico car park to take them to Sophia. Three persons were subsequently arrested, but it is unclear if any charges were ever laid against them.
Another brutal murder was that of female taxi driver Seerajie Singh on February 10, the same year. She was shot dead by two young passengers, she reportedly knew before being pushed out of her vehicle.
According to reports, Singh was hired around 10:30 pm on the tragic day to do a pick up with her vehicle at Success, East Coast Demerara. Two men joined the car and requested to be taken to Ogle but while on the airstrip road, she was held at gunpoint and instructed to get out of the vehicle.
However the woman reportedly refused and was shot in the mouth before being pushed out of the vehicle. She later died at Georgetown Hospital where she was taken by police.
Diligent police investigations led to the arrests of several persons in a house at Linden.
Anandram Dhanraj of Lot 128 Seventh Street, Success; Naresh Boodhoo of Success Housing Scheme and a 16-year-old, who lived in the same area, were charged with her murder several days later.
During 2007, several more taxi drivers lost their lives while serving the public.
On May 27, the battered body of Dirk Simon, a 29-year-old ex-policeman was found in a swamp close to the roadside at Profitt, West Coast Berbice while his hijacked car was later found abandoned in a trench at Blairmont.
He was found face down with wounds to the back of his head, face and right arm pit. A piece of bloodstained wood was found nearby.
Simon, who was attached to Kitty Cabs on Sheriff Street, according to reports, was called to do a pick up at Sheriff Street and drop the customer off on South Road, around 10 pm on May 26.
That was the last time anyone had any contact with him.
Unclear circumstances
To date not much is known about the circumstances surrounding the death of Germaine Best, 25, of Lot 60 Graham Street, Plaisance in July 2007. He was beaten and stabbed by unknown person/s and left to die in an alleyway in Sunflower Drive, South Ruimveldt. He succumbed to his injuries several days later at the Georgetown Hospital.
The man’s relatives were baffled as to who might have carried out the attack and the reason.
Best had earlier dropped his girlfriend off at her home in South Ruimveldt. It is unclear if the perpetrators may have boarded, Best’s vehicle after he left his girlfriend’s home and then attacked him near the alleyway.
A relative had told this newspaper that from all indications, the man was dragged from his car and beaten with a golf stick before being stabbed in the abdomen.
Mohammed Rasool known as Trevor Munroe became the first victim of 2008 when he was shot in the back and left on the road at Penny Lane, South Ruimveldt. His car which was purchased about two years before his death was subsequently found at Guyhoc.
Rasool who is believed to have been a victim of a hijacking was last seen around, 7 o’clock, at the Ruimveldt mosque, the night before his body was found.
Eight months later, ex-policeman Vibert Assanah, 57, was stabbed to death by one of two men who had hired him outside the Georgetown Hospital on October 26.
According to reports, the men stopped the car on Bent Street between Hardina and Haley streets and it was there that the wound that caused the man’s death was inflicted with a knife.
It is believed that the men had wanted the car, which Assanah had recently bought but he refused to hand it over.
Global
Positioning System
Sheriff Taxi driver, Keith Bowen became the first victim for this year when he was murdered by unknown persons and thrown out of his car.
His employer, Gregory Toovey following his death had proposed using a GPS tracking system for his drivers. However the information he received indicated that it could only work to an extent.
While expressing concerns about the increase in carjackings, Toovey had said that he always advised his drivers to keep in contact with the base so that their whereabouts could be known at all times.
It was around 8 pm on March 19, when a car stopped briefly on the dark road near the entrance to the `Island’ at West La Penitence. An explosion rang out shortly after and the vehicle then drove off. An elderly woman subsequently found Bowen, lying just off the road, bleeding profusely from a gunshot wound to the right side of his head. He was transported to the Georgetown Hospital where he died while undergoing treatment.
Bowen’s dark grey car bearing number plate HB 264 and the taxi service’s logo was found abandoned on Princes Street in the vicinity of Lombard Street around 7:30 the following morning. There were bloodstains on the driver’s seat and on the inside of one of the doors.
The last contact anyone had with the man was around 8:30 on the morning of March 19, when he made his last drop and contacted the base saying that his car was overheating. The man did not pick up his seven-year-old son from school and never went home.
Several months later on May 3, at La Bonne Intention (LBI) Rolston Bernard Henry was found with his hands bound behind his back, gagged and with several stab wounds to his body. There was also burn marks to his chest.
The car he owned was found in a trench at Plaisance, East Coast Demerara minus the amplifier. Clifton Graham is currently before the court charged with the murder.
Unfortunate
death
Two weeks ago 70-year-old Nazir Khan, a taxi driver attached to Rockerz Taxi Service at Parika, was found dead in his car at Stewartville.
Khan, a resident of Lot 172 Railway Line, East Bank Essequibo was last seen around 11 pm on August 28 when he left the base with two passengers bound for Stewartville.
Several hours later, he was found in a reclining position in the driver’s seat with what appeared to be a stab wound to the chest area, and parts of his body, including his face were covered with blood. When he was discovered, $18,000 which he had when he left home and his earnings for the night as well as his identification card were missing.
A post-mortem examination later revealed that he was shot and two suspects who were held for questioning were subsequently released.
A representative of Rockerz told Stabroek News recently that the killing was unfortunate and the taxi service was currently looking at ways to avoid a reoccurrence in the future.
According to him this will include screening passengers who go to the base requesting a taxi. His proposal for remedying this situation is taking photographs of such persons as well as to screen unknown callers.
“We have to be careful. We got to start screening passengers… The ones that walk in, we will have to ask them to take out their pictures,” he said.
Asked what would happen if a passenger refuses, he said they would have a choice to comply or not as all he wants to do is protect his drivers.
Quizzed about the security he provides to his drivers at night, the man said that the dispatcher would keep in contact via cellular phones.
This base never previously encountered a problem until now he said adding that the other base at Zeeburg had been victim to several hijackings last year, but none of the drivers were hurt.
There are many taxi services around the city that do not pick up passengers on the roadways especially at night. They rely on telephone calls.
City Taxi Service, which has been in operation since 1968 is one such company. City has had its share of carjackings and has repeatedly warned its drivers to be careful.
Judgement
A driver of Green Ice (GI) taxi service said recently that it is all up to the driver to exercise his judgement when he goes to do a pick up.
He explained that drivers had to be vigilant when picking up passengers on the road and keep in constant contact with the dispatcher, so that their whereabouts could be known at all times.
The driver explained that there are times when people call from “certain areas” for pickup. “There ain’t nothing much we can do but keep contact with the base. If the dispatcher feel strange about anything, he would alert us and tell us to be careful”, the man said recalling that several of his colleagues have fallen victim to carjackers but none was ever killed.
Another driver told Stabroek News that while he depends on driving for his daily bread he tries his utmost to stop working around 9 pm, each day. He said the most drivers can do is to be alert at all times but stressed that there are instances this does not work as the passengers don’t look like they have “devious intentions”.
