A Corriverton man was fatally shot yesterday morning while he was standing in a crowd that had gathered to witness a fight between fellow villagers.
Marlon Brandon Fordyce, 31, of Lot 39 Albert Street, Corriverton, left home around 8.10 am and was minutes after shot once to the right side of his neck below his ear at Little India, Corriverton, which is located a short distance away from his home.
Commander of Region Six, Calvin Brutus, told Stabroek News that police were still combing the area for the suspects.
According to the commander, there was a wounding on Thursday evening in the area and based on information received, the assailant was being confronted when the shooting occurred yesterday morning.
According to the commander, the suspects, who arrived in a blue car during the confrontation, discharged shots towards the assailant’s direction but hit Fordyce as he stood in the crowd instead.
Stabroek News was told that the police quickly arrived at the scene and gave chase. However, the suspects fled into the Number 70 backlands, where they are suspected to be hiding out, while their car, PJJ 2319, was found abandoned at Number 76 Village.
As of yesterday afternoon, police were still on the hunt for the suspects, who are said to be from Line Path, Corentyne and East Canje Berbice. Additionally, ranks from New Amsterdam were sent to Corriverton to assist with the search.
Meanwhile, residents in Little India, Corriverton, where the shooting transpired, were extremely tight-lipped about the events that unfolded there. However, one resident, who spoke to Stabroek News on the condition of anonymity, said he was on his bridge when he saw that a fight had started. “I heard the one chop up somebody, so he [the chopping victim’s] people them come looking for he [the assailant] and about twenty a them went here fighting, and then the two [suspects] come and them fire one shot in the air and the man [assailant] start run and them fire the second shot from he but it catch the next bai and everybody just left he a ground and run gone,” he explained.
Fordyce was rushed to the Skeldon Public Hospital shortly after and was immediately transferred to the New Amsterdam Public Hospital and then shortly after transferred to the Georgetown Public Hospital, where he succumbed just around 8 pm.
Fordyce’s common-law wife, Deon Vanderstoop, also known as “Dolly”, 29, yesterday said that the man left home after he noticed a crowd at the end of his street. “He was supposed to throw water for me to wash and he say man a going and see wah going on at the back because I hear fight at the back and I tell he man don’t go because who gon’ throw out water. But he say man he going and see wah going on quick and come out back. He say man a promise you I ain’t taking long,” she recounted.
According to Vanderstoop, who is eight months pregnant, Fordyce then used a bicycle to get to the location where the fight was happening. “I watching and I only seeing a crowd because I went on the bridge but be time I turn around I see people running and come back and people saying a next dead and I asking who dead but everybody hustling to run down and na bother with me,” she added.
She said she was then informed that Fordyce was “dead” but relatives then rushed to the scene where they discovered that the man was alive but unresponsive.
“He get one shot and somewhere to he temple they say,” the woman noted.
According to the woman, Fordyce, a father of two, had no ongoing issue with anyone in the community.
Vanderstoop confirmed his death last night.
In 2015, Fordyce and a co-accused, Troy Stewart, were freed of a murder charge after Justice Franklyn Holder at the High Court in Berbice, upheld a no-case submission submitted by their lawyers. Fordyce and Stewart had pleaded not guilty to the charge of killing Rajmohan Phaskanran, also known as ‘Cowboy,’ who was a fisherman, of Number 79 Village, Corentyne. It was alleged, that on December 18, 2012, Phaskanran was brutally chopped and succumbed on December 26, while being admitted in the Georgetown Public Hospital’s Intensive Care Unit.
