Investigations into the Easter Monday shooting at Windsor Forest, during which three villagers were shot, are ongoing, Head of the police Office for Professional Responsibility (OPR) Assistant Commis-sioner, Mohamed Jameer says.
“I won’t be able to say. We’re depending on people,” he responded when asked how long more investigations were likely to take. No one has been charged as yet, he said. On Easter Monday night, police and residents clashed in the West Demerara community and three persons were struck by pellets.
Police had said that they were forced to open fire after a crowd – irate after police ordered the music sets to be turned off – attacked them. Residents denied that they had attacked the police. However, persons set tyres alight and dragged a trailer across the road as some protested the detention of several persons responsible for the music sets.
Several persons were beaten, reportedly by angry ranks, during the incident and over a dozen were arrested. Residents made several allegations about the police, including that ranks had demanded money for them to allow the music to continue playing. Following the incident, the police announced that the OPR had launched an investigation into the incident.
An overseas based Guyanese, Hansraj Ori, was struck in the neck and abdomen by pellets. He was hospitalised and doctors removed two pellets from his abdomen and a third from his neck.
A senior police official informed Stabroek News recently that a .32 warhead was removed from Ori’s body, suggesting that someone in the crowd, other than the police fired a shot. The official explained that the police who turned up at the scene on the night of the incident were only armed with shotguns and rifles and one round was discharged at the crowd. He said that that shot would have released multiple pellets and not a warhead.
The surgery was done at a private hospital and the bullet removed was handed over to the police and will be sent for analysis.
The official said that the evidence would suggest that when the clash occurred, someone in the crowd shot at the ranks and the bullet accidentally hit Ori.
Ramnarine Jagroop, another of the men who was shot, told Stabroek News yesterday that they had not heard back from the police since giving a statement. Jagroop, who was wounded by two pellets in his upper thigh, said that seven men were to be charged but a government MP met with them and said that she will look into the matter and no one will go to court. Following this intervention, the seven men all received back their station bail, he said. However, he noted, nine others are yet to collect back their bail money.
Jagroop said that police had promised that by this week, they will hear back from them. But up to yesterday, he said, they had heard nothing.
He said that residents want action to be taken but he does not believe that they will get satisfaction because it is the police who are investigating themselves.
He said that residents want the removal of the officer who fired the shot. “Dem want this man to move urgently,” he said.
