A Cumberland, East Canje, Berbice man succumbed during his third visit to the New Amsterdam Public Hospital last Thursday, after he suffered a suspected chop wound to the head.
Dead is Arjunan Andiappan, also known as ‘Keks’, 58, who was a labourer of Kalabash Creek.
The fatal wound was inflicted during an altercation at Wallace Street, East Canje Berbice, on Thursday just before 1 pm.
The suspect turned himself over to the police.
Sunday Stabroek was told that the man’s mother was arrested as well for allegedly hiding the murder weapon.
The deceased man’s sister, Tangache Balgobin, of New Street, Cumberland, East Canje, Berbice, was informed just after 1 pm that her brother was chopped to his head.
She said the mother of the suspect first rushed the man to the New Amsterdam Public Hospital, where he received some stitches before being discharged.
However, after noticing that Andiappan was still bleeding, Balgobin took him back to the hospital for a second time but he was sent home again as hospital staff claimed they could do nothing more for him.
“When I take him the second time they refuse me and I tell them he bleeding and the nurse said the doctor already stitch him they can’t do nothing so let I bring he home back,” Balgobin said.
However, she took him to the hospital for a third time after she noticed that he was still bleeding from his head.
The man was then taken to the hospital’s emergency care unit, where he eventually succumbed.
Relatives yesterday noted that while the man was in the emergency unit they were told that he was in a critical condition and attempts were being made to have him transferred to the Georgetown Public Hospital. “But they say he can’t travel because the brains already seize so he don’t have long to live,” his sister said. “I go inside and I tell the doctor if she can check for a pulse when I see how my brother lie down but she say yes there is a pulse but the thing they put on his finger does blink and it wasn’t blinking and them tell me to go wait outside and about 10 minutes after I go in back and I ask them to tell me what really happen to my brother and then she tell me my brother passed away,” she added.
The deceased’s sister yesterday said that she believed that had the hospital admitted her brother when he was first rushed there the possibility exists that he could have still been alive.
She stressed, “I think if they did admit him and try their best to see what they coulda do he woulda probably live.”
Meanwhile, it is unclear what may have led to the chopping.
Balgobin noted that although her brother was a known alcoholic, he never interfered with anyone. “Them boys at the street tell me my brother didn’t do them people nothing. They didn’t hear a fight but some a them see when he chop my brother,” she said of the attack.
