Yesterday around 12.30 pm Sabita Ghoordani, 36, had just finished placing the silver and gold jewellery she sells along with cash in a haversack to head home when she was robbed by two men believed to be in their late teens.
When this newspaper visited Ghoordani’s home in ‘C’ Field Leonora, West Coast Demerara (WCD) yesterday afternoon, she was still at the police station giving a statement. According to persons who were at the market at the time, and from Ghoordani’s mother, stated that one of the men placed a gun to Ghoordani’s throat and the other snatched the haversack which contained the day’s sales, jewellery and Ghoordani’s cell phone.
As the men escaped into the cane fields, three warning shots were fired.
Meanwhile, the police acting on information managed to track the men to an empty bushy lot where they were hiding out. A senior police source said it was diligent police investigation that led to the spotting of the robbers.
But according to Parbati Ghoordani, Ghoordani’s mother, one of the robbers was known to her daughter, who had taken the police to the neighbouring village, Stewartville, where he lived but they were told that he was not at home.
The location where the men were discovered was around the Zeeburg High Bridge, WCD. The bridge has a canal running through cane fields on one side and a koker on the other. The men were on the side where the canal leads into cane fields. The empty plot of land and the dam leading to the fields have a dense growth of grass that is tall enough to hide a man.
According to the police source, the men had challenged the police who in return injured one to the foot while the other surrendered. One resident who lives just over the high bridge said she heard two shots fired and when she looked out the police were wrestling the men to the ground.
The robbers were then placed into the police vehicle and taken to the Leonora Police Station.
Meanwhile, Ghoordani’s husband suspects that he and his wife were being observed before the robbery. Ghandi or ‘Moonshine’ as he is called told this newspaper that early yesterday when he and his wife went to the market to set up their stall, three men including the two that later robbed his wife were at the market.
His wife, he said, overheard one of the men saying “look he deh deh” as the three passed their stall. He added that the robber pointed out by his wife was well known in the area. The couple had recently started the business as an added means of income. Ghandi was unable to say how much they had lost.
