Car gunmen frisk guard, fire at another in Subryanville
North East La Penitence man escaped death in other attack
Stabroek News
July 19, 2002
The calm of Subryanville was shattered yesterday morning when three men in a white car fired two rounds after a failed bid to disarm one of three security guards.
Reports reaching Stabroek News state that shortly after 0900 hrs, at Church Road, Subryanville, three heavily armed men disembarked a white car, HB 50, accosted a security officer attached to the Professional Guard Service (PGS) and frisked him for his weapon. The guard was apparently heading home after completing his shift at a residence in the neighbourhood.
A source at PGS told this newspaper that the guard related that the three men, who themselves were armed with shotguns, kept asking him [the guard] for his gun. They drove off after being told that the weapon had been lodged at his office.
While the men searched his person, the guard reported seeing a woman and two children lying on the floor of the car. There were also two revolvers in the vehicle. The guard said, too, that as the gunmen drove off, they fired a shot at him. At the time, another guard, a female chief inspector on her way home from work, too, narrowly escaped injury.
Stabroek News learnt also that another security guard, who was observing the incident from the yard of a businessman, came under fire from the fleeing gunmen after they spotted him watching. The sound of gunshots brought the MMC Security Force to the scene. But by then, the gunmen had already fled. No injuries were reported.
When Stabroek News visited the area yesterday, residents appeared to be going about their normal business. A guard in the vicinity told Stabroek News that an investigating rank from the Kitty Police Station had warned him not to divulge any information to the media. The guard said he was told to refer members of the press to the investigating rank, instead, but at the station, the policeman said he was not in a position to give out any information. He said that was the job of the Public Relations Department at Eve Leary.
Public Relations Officer of the Guyana Police Force, Assistant Superintendent David Ramnarine only confirmed that the police "were investigating an incident where a white car with three bandits allegedly discharged two rounds in the air on Church Road."
In a surprising twist, Stabroek News has learnt that the gunmen were using the same car which had circled the scene of another shooting in North East La Penitence on Wednesday night.
At the Harpy Drive, North East La Penitence home of the Weekeses yesterday, Abiola Weekes told this newspaper that her 20-year-old brother, Vibert Weekes, narrowly escaped death at the hands of two men who got out of a red car bearing the logo of a popular taxi service.
According to the young woman, the gunmen, identified as `Ching Pong' and `Big Batty', opened fire on her brother as he ran to the back of the house. Although family members claim not to have seen the young Weekes since the incident, they maintained that he was not injured.
Recounting the moment before 2000 hrs when the gunmen struck, Weekes' mother, Eeyola, told this newspaper: "This car come driving through slow and pass. So I get up and I watch this thing... It go through de street and turn back."
That was when the two gunmen got out and rushed into the yard at WW 7 Harpy Drive.
"The one with the white cap come running in de yard with he hand under he jersey and I say, `Vibie, Vibie, whuh he running in hey for?'"
She said her son, Vibert, immediately ran to the back of the house and escaped. His five-month-old daughter was in her stroller next to the adults and later had to be whisked into the house as shots were fired.
"When he [Vibert] run at the back... meh mother hold on pon [Ching Pong] say, `Whuh you all coming fo do meh son?' But he rail out meh mother hand, run at the back... and fire behind meh brother, but no bullet ain't touch he, he run away," Abiola Weekes narrated.
She added that the gunmen "walk out de yard back comfortable", checked for her brother through a nearby alleyway, then left after ascertaining that he had eluded them.
"When they turn back, meh next brother holler, `Yuh see how y'all come fo do innocent people thing? Why y'all don't go and look for de right people and do them thing?' and `Ching Pong' end up kicking meh brother. Slap he up, box meh sister who is 14 years old and end up going fo shoot Ervin. But `Batty' words was, `Lef duh youth man. Is not duh youth man do nothing to we, is he brother.'," Abiola stated.
Eeyola Weekes told Stabroek News that when neighbours heard the gunshots, they started to shout that they were calling the police. That apparently forced the driver of the red car to drive away. She said her nephew, Sherwin Weekes, who was inside the house and unaware of what was taking place, emerged and, while attempting to drive off in his car, was fired at by the two gunmen. The men apparently left the scene on foot.
Prior to Wednesday evening's shooting, Abiola said someone had warned them that the two men were coming to kill her brother.
"Saturday night, me brother went inside a dance and `Ching Pong' and `Big Batty' watching he fo shoot he. But he didn't know nothing... Earlier, we hear they coming and shoot up Vibie," the young woman stated.
But the saga had not ended there. After the group returned from the police station on Wednesday night where they had gone to report the matter, another car, this time a white, bearing the licence plate HB 50, was observed circling the house slowly. Neighbours yesterday told the Weekes that the occupants of the car were enquiring about the whereabouts of Sherwin Weekes. The Weekes later learnt also that occupants of the same car were asking for the young man in Norton Street, Georgetown, where he usually hangs out.
"They say they ain't done with he [Vibert Weekes]..." the Weekes women reported. Asked about possible motive for the attack, the women both spoke of an incident which occurred three weeks ago.
"These people get rob about three weeks ago and claiming that how my brother know de people and why he don't come and talk... since then, they after he," Abiola told Stabroek News. Her mother, too, said, "Is a girl claiming that she house get jump [on June 27]. She say that my son know the fellers, but my son saying he don't know is who...She turn and tell me [on July 1] she things dem ain't going down de drain...[that] people body got to drop."