Troy Collymore who was declared brain dead by doctors at the public hospital on Friday was yesterday pronounced “clinically dead” at midday and removed from the ventilator which had been maintaining his breathing because he had no heart rate. In stormy scenes, his relatives accused the hospital staff of causing his death.
Collymore called ‘Nellie,’ 30, of Diamond, East Bank Demerara was declared “clinically dead” by doctors at the Georgetown Public Hospital as a result of the gunshot wound he sustained to the head during a robbery at Plaisance, East Coast Demerara on Thursday some time around 9pm.
In a statement issued by the hospital yesterday afternoon, it was said that both the consultant and the attending medical officer of the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) where Collymore was being treated, found that he had no heart rate, following which he was taken off the ventilator and certified dead.
Yesterday around 12.15pm when this newspaper went to visit Collymore who was a patient in the Intensive Care Unit, loud wailing could be heard inside the ICU as well as a female voice asking for proof that Collymore had died.
Shortly afterwards Collymore’s mother, Gloria, burst through the doors of ICU tears streaming down her face saying, “They kill he! They kill he!”
Cell phone in hand she went to the seating area and made a phone call and then went through the doors to the ICU again. A female voice inside could still be heard calling the doctors and nurses “murderers.”
Hospital security, first a woman and then a man, next made their way into the ICU, followed shortly after by a police officer.
Pandemonium broke out following Gloria’s exit from the ICU once more. She was accompanied by Collymore’s other relatives all lamenting that the hospital “kill he.” One particularly vocal cousin was escorted outside by the police officer. She flung herself on the ground tears streaming down both cheeks as she shouted to anyone who would listen, “They tek it [ventilator] off, he did breathing off he own. They telling me that they do it – ow God. What evil they rain down on we Troy? What evil?”
In the midst of the chaos of curious visitors, hospital staff and crying relatives, the wife of Collymore recounted the details of the last moments she shared with him yesterday morning: “He had on a white top and a mauve pants and I tell he look out fuh the children,” she recalled, shaking her head and fighting back tears. “I know he did gone,” she added.
“All I want he do is go safe. All I want he do is blow good breeze pun he children,” she said. The couple have two children aged five and seven. She said they had been together since she was 14 years old, going on to say she had no idea how she would break the news of her husband’s death to her children.
As more relatives arrived hospital security was forced to stop persons from entering the ICU. Then about six police officers in bullet-proof vests and armed with guns arrived. They made their way into the ICU and when they came out the cousin told them, “He did breathing without the machine when they tek it off. The machine didn’t supporting he, he did supporting himself!”
She then told the police that when they left the hospital on Friday around 12 midnight her cousin was doing okay and when they arrived yesterday the doctor only called in Collymore’s mother and she followed. “He heart was beating. Ah beg them come prove me wrong,” she pleaded with the officers.
As she told her story a female doctor came out and pointed out the cousin to which the latter shouted in response, “Ahya murder he!” The doctor went back inside and a female officer came and asked the cousin to go downstairs with her, but she refused.
A male officer then came over and instructed his female counterpart to arrest her. Other family members started to crowd around the officers asking why she was being arrested, while the cousin refused to leave because Collymore’s body had not yet been removed.
The officers eventually took hold of her nevertheless and took her away while she was still voicing her complaints against the hospital staff. As the other family members continued to bemoan their loss they were met with comforting words by visitors waiting to go into the ICU to visit their relatives as well as passers-by.
The events that resulted in the shooting of Collymore remain unclear and persons in the immediate area said that they did not see anything.
According to the police version of the events, overseas based Guyanese Noel Phillips, Collymore of Plaisance Squatting Area and Chandrika Datt called ‘Shiv,’ 27, of Industry, were chatting in front of a drugstore owned by Datt, when he left to close the store after attending to a customer.
At this point, a gunman entered and held him up while Taylor and another accomplice, who were also armed, accosted Phillips and Collymore outside. The armed man took away a quantity of jewellery valued at $320,000 along with eight laptop computers from Datt, while his accomplices took away jewellery valued at $600,000 and an undisclosed sum of cash from Phillips.
“During the robbery rounds were discharged which resulted in Taylor being shot and killed,” while Phillips was shot in his right arm and chest, Collymore was shot in the head, and Clyde Harris also of Plaisance who was in the vicinity received a gunshot wound in his left jaw, the police said.
Police investigations into the matter are ongoing.
Hospital
Meanwhile, the GPHC in defence of its staff said in a press release, “The hospital employs very competent and professional staff; moreover, it will not tolerate the abuse of its staff particularly when they are performing their duties.”
According to the GPHC during routine checks, both the consultant and the attending medical officer of the ICU found that Collymore had no heart rate after which he was taken off the ventilator and certified dead.
The hospital condemned the actions of the relatives in threatening the doctors. “Mr Collymore’s relatives assumed that the doctors took him off of the ventilator and this caused his death,” the release said. “One relative (female) began to abuse the staff, particularly, the doctor. She threatened the doctors, swearing on a bible that within three days, she (doctor) and her family will all die. These threats were also directed at any physician visible to her.”
The threats, the release added “traumatised” the doctor who later had to be escorted home out of fear that the relatives would return and follow through on their threats.
“It has been noticed that a trend has recently developed whereby when loved ones die, relatives suddenly become physicians and determine what caused the death. They refuse to heed the professional’s medical advice and are quick to blame the medical and nursing staff for causing the deaths; with unsubstantiated speculations,” the release stated.
Meanwhile at the home of Gloria in Plaisance, the woman’s crying had eased a little. It was some time after two in the afternoon. She was in her living room with her two daughters receiving visitors who came to offer condolences and words of comfort. Melinda, Collymore’s sister described the dead man as “a loving and caring brother.”
Gloria broke down in tears as she remembered how her son, the second of six children, would always come home telling her he loved her. “Nobody can love me like how he love me,” she wept.
She was still of the belief that the doctor was responsible for the death of her son. She said her family had planned to move him to a private hospital before she learned of his death and bemoaned the fact that she had not been told in advance that the doctor planned to take her son off life support, “When she [the doctor] call me, she say to me ‘You know you son gah a terrible brain damage’ and then she tell me he’s dead just like that.”
On Friday she had told Stabroek News that doctors had informed her that the only thing keeping Collymore alive was a life support machine.
