Dreylan Johnson

GuyExpo 2016 saw the launch of Guyana’s latest footwear brand, Limers, owned by Patrice St Clair Hinds, a UK national, born to Guyanese parents.

“There was no negligence or abandonment of duty,” Joint Services attorney Selwyn Pieters said during his final submissions yesterday to the Commission of Inquiry (CoI) into the March 3 prison unrest and deaths.

Testimony before the Commission of Inquiry into the fatal prison unrest yesterday confirmed that the siren, which is sounded to indicate there is an emergency at the Camp Street prison, did not go off at the sighting of the first fire on March 3.

According to Udistair Holligan, who was the Task Force Commander at the Georgetown Prison on March 3rd, the situation on the ground went from a controlled to an uncontrollable environment in a matter of 20 minutes after the takedown of one of the suspected ringleaders of the unrest.

-fire service took around eight minutes to arriveOfficer-in-Charge of the Georgetown Prison, Superintendent Kevin Pilgrim yesterday said that using the adjoining dorm to fight the deadly fire in the Capital A Division, where 17 inmates died last month, would have required sending his officers into a “fatal funnel.”

Embattled Deputy Director of Prisons Gladwin Samuels yesterday insisted that he did all he could to safeguard the lives of the Camp Street Prison inmates on March 3rd, when 17 of them died, and suggested that prisoners would be hard-pressed to give a true account of the events due to fear.

Deputy Director of Prisons Gladwin Samuels was once again accused by an inmate as being the authority who passed an instruction for the door to the burning Capital Division at the camp Street prison to be shut on March 3, when 17 prisoners died.

A fire on February 23rd at a Lodge house, where two adult autistic brothers had to be rescued by alert neighbours has underlined the need for early intervention in diagnosing the disorder.

Camp Street Prison inmate Collis Collison yesterday testified of his knowledge of the door to the Capital A block being obstructed by inmates two days in succession.

An inmate yesterday testified that Deputy Prisons Director Gladwin Samuels had ordered that the door to the Capital A section be closed prior to the fire inside that claimed the lives of 17 prisoners at the Camp Street Prison.

Inmate Michael Lewis yesterday maintained that tear gas was thrown into the Capital Division of the Camp Street Prison on the day a fire raged through the area claiming 17 lives.

Inmate Michael Lewis yesterday said prison officials had ample opportunity to rescue prisoners from the March 3rd fatal fire, in which 17 of his fellow inmates died.

-throwing of tear gas recalled Although unable to identify who started the deadly fire that killed 17 at the Camp Street prison, two inmates yesterday testified that it was the alleged assault on fellow inmates by officers that led to the unrest that preceded the blaze.

Former Minister of Public Service Jennifer Westford and the ministry’s past Chief Personnel Officer Margaret Cummings were yesterday arraigned on 24 charges alleging they stole more than $639 million from the Government of Guyana.

Three more persons were yesterday charged over their alleged involvement in the murder of British teen Dominic Bernard.