Category Archives: Kidnapping

Who really are the monsters?

By Dr Selwyn Cudjoe
February 23, 2021

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeSome people described the killing of Andrea Bharatt as “monstrous”, “brutal”, “horrible”, and “barbarous”. Those responsible for her death were called “monsters” or “Lucifers in the flesh”.

An autopsy showed the horrendous manner in which Andrea was killed. Rich and poor, Africans and Indians, urban and rural folks, were all repulsed by the barbarity of her killers.
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Candles, tears and selected outrage

By Aileen Alexis
February 11, 2021

lettersThe kidnapping and murder of a young court clerk, Andrea Bharratt has evoked strong emotions from a wide cross-section of the Trinibagonian population. Protests, vigils and calls for legislation regarding the use of non-lethal weapons such as pepper spray and tasers, and the resumption of hangings have all become some of the manifestations of these emotions.
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Be careful when you hunt rapists

By Raffique Shah
February 08, 2021

Raffique ShahTHE outrage expressed by many people over the most recent case of the abduction and murder of a young woman is understandable.

We cannot believe that there exist among us depraved people who are capable of committing atrocities, inflicting extreme violence on women with seemingly consummate ease and callous detachment. It’s as if they are cast in some science fiction horror movie, acting out their darkest obsessions and cruellest fantasies, except the victims are real live people who end up very dead, sometimes mutilated and tortured before they die.
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Enter Gary Griffith: Act One

By Raffique Shah
September 19, 2018

Raffique ShahGary Griffith couldn’t have scripted a better opening act for his entry onto the national stage as the new Commissioner of Police, even if he were the Bard of Cascade or whatever suburb he lives in or comes from.

After six years of play-acting by career police officer Stephen Williams, and amidst much intrigue, controversy and good old Trinidad bacchanal over the selection of a new CoP, which featured principal parts played by politicians of every hue and persuasion, not to add cameos by a significant number among the “extras” in the 1.4 million population, Gary landed the starring role—and what an entry he made.
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8 not guilty, retrial for two: Vindra Naipaul-Coolman murder trial

By Rickie Ramdass
May 31, 2016 – trinidadexpress.com

Vindra Naipaul-CoolmanEIGHT of the ten men on trial for the murder of businesswoman Vindra Naipaul-Coolman, were found not guilty of the crime this afternoon.

Retrials have been ordered in the case of the two other murder accused.

The verdicts were announced at around 5.30p.m in the Hall of Justice, Port of Spain before Justice Malcolm Holdip.
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BABY DEAD IN CESSPIT

By Alexander Bruzual
November 21, 2013 – newsday.co.tt

BABY DEAD IN CESSPITTHE search for a two-year-old baby boy ended in tragedy yesterday afternoon after his body was found inside a cesspit located at the back of the child’s father’s Maracas/St Joseph home.

At about 1.15 pm yesterday police officers from the St Joseph CID and the Maracas Police Station, led by Sergeant Rene Katwaroo, made their way to the home of Allan Thomas, located along Santa Rita Trace, Lluengo Village, Maracas/St Joseph. The officers were responding to a report made by Thomas on Tuesday night, in which he alleged that his son, Jacob Munroe, two, had been kidnapped.
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Strangers in our land

Newsday Editorial
May 1 2011 – newsday.co.tt

ChineseThe recent kidnapping for ransom of a citizen of China who owned and operated a restaurant at St Helena has brought to the fore, once again, the question of illegal immigrants living and working in Trinidad and Tobago.

Speaking in Senate recently, Independent Senator Rolph Balgobin raised this issue.
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Chinese Kidnapping – Slain Restaurant Owner

Kidnapped Chinese restaurant owner Xue Hua Shan
Kidnapped Chinese restaurant owner Xue Hua Shan

Cops step up search for kidnapped woman
Police probing the kidnapping of Chinese restaurant owner Xue Hua Shan said her relatives told them that the woman’s mother, in China, received a text message saying her daughter was released. The text message, police said, was sent in a Chinese dialect to Shan’s mother who lives in China. Investigators said they had not contacted Shan’s mother and did not know if the message was true or a hoax. But detectives said yesterday that they were still looking for Shan and had no concrete evidence she had been released by her kidnappers. The lawmen said they have stepped up their search for Shan after also receiving a message from someone who called the Piarco Police Station around 6.30 am yesterday, claiming she had been dropped off near a bridge in St Helena.
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