Man in custody over murder of Guyanese in T&T

Deceased: A mother of two was killed alongside her children in a vehicular accident on Thursday
Deceased: A mother of two was killed alongside her children in a vehicular accident on Thursday

(Trinidad Guardian) A 24-year-old Santa Cruz man is assisting police with their investigation into the murder of his 44-year-old friend Kwesi Mona. Mona, 44, a Guyanese national, was found dead at his Curepe home on Wednesday night and the man unconscious near him.

Kwesi Mona (Trinidad Guardian photo)

Police said around 9.45 pm they received a report from the landlord of an Alice Street apartment complex of a commotion there. When police arrived they found Mona dead and his friend unconscious. The man was taken to hospital where he remained in a stable condition under police guard Thursday night. Mona, a security guard, was described by relatives as the life of the party at the Forensic Science Centre, St James, yesterday. They said he had been in the country for close to 20 years and was the father of a 16-year-old.

According to his autopsy report, Mona was beaten on the head and strangled with a belt. The cause of death was ligature strangulation, but the several blows to his head resulted in no head trauma, the report stated. “We don’t know if the murder has to deal with his sexuality. We don’t know if they were hanging out and an argument ensued.

He was wonderful, really nice guy, always helpful and loving. All people mattered to him, it didn’t matter if they was gay or straight,” one relative of Mona said. The relative added that Mona’s way of living should be the way everyone lived.

“He was always the family clown, he would always be the one to bring the jokes and always find something funny to say,” relatives said.