A 25-year-old fisherman is dead and his brother is now hospitalised at the West Demerara Regional Hospital after they were attacked by three men on Thursday night at Zeelugt, East Bank Essequibo.
The Guyana Police Force said the fatal attack resulted in the death of Alvin Gajraj, also known as ‘Chockoloo,’ of 820 ‘G’ Zeelugt North, East Bank Essequibo, who was chopped to death, and the injury of his brother, Devendra ‘Shameer’ Seenarine, 17, who is hospitalised.
The police have so far apprehended two of the three suspects, who were known to the brothers.
Meera Gajraj told Sunday Stabroek that Alvin and Devendra, who are her brothers, had been drinking at her residence with her husband and her brother-in-law on Thursday. She said Alvin had only returned from sea earlier in the day.
During the night, Meera added, Devendra said he wanted to go home. As a result, Alvin decided he would drop his brother home. It was as they were riding out of the village that they were attacked by three men. One was armed with a cutlass, another with a crowbar and the other with a piece of wood.
The three men, Meera said, live in the same village and worked with her brothers at sea. “They know one another because they does normally work at sea together and I don’t know if they had any problems,” the woman related.
She said that not too long after her brothers left, she heard loud screaming, “hollering and cussing” and her two brothers quickly came to mind. “I know me brothers left to come out and I hear one of them the men cussing hard and I run out and I see one of them beating Devendra, who went in the drain and I watching on all the time and begging he to stop but he refuse to, so I run back home and tell me husband put me on the bicycle and carry me to let me go call some other relatives,” Meera recounted.
At the time, she said, she only saw her younger brother. She had no idea where Alvin was.
Meera said she was also told that Devendra tried to escape from the three men but he slipped and fell into a drain and one of them then launched a vicious attack on him.
While one of them attacked Devendra, Alvin ran but he was followed by the other two men.
Meera returned to the scene with family members but did not find Devendra. However, she was told that he was rushed to the hospital by another relative and was receiving treatment.
Not too long after, Meera said that she saw the three men walking casually through one of the streets, and one of them told her, “Go and see my buddy at the wall done dead.”
She became alarmed and rushed to the north of the village, where she searched up and down for her brother. She only discovered him after she had quit searching and was returning home.
Meera said she found her brother’s motionless body in a pile of rock not too far from where her younger brother was attacked. “They mean to kill them and Shameer lucky he didn’t dead too,” she said.
Alvin’s body was picked up and rushed to the Leonora Hospital, where he was pronounced dead on arrival.
The woman believes that the attack was premeditated since neighbours related that the three men were waiting on the brothers. But she is unsure whether they wanted to attack them both or just one of them.
Devendra remained a patient at the West Demerara Hospital up to last evening and, according to his sister, he was conscious. He did not receive any life threatening injuries.
The remaining suspect is said to have been the man who was armed with the cutlass during the attack.
