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Christmas Falls Shootout…..Trapped?
It’s a matter of survival – Joint Services officer
Six days after they raided the hideout of a notorious gang of gunmen, killing one of them in the process, the Joint Services believe that the surviving members are trapped in the dense jungle of the Upper Demerara/Upper Berbice area.
A senior Joint Services officer who did not wish to be named told this newspaper that it would be difficult for the gunmen to escape the dragnet that has been set up to capture them.
“If you look at a map of the area you will see what they have to go through to escape. It is jungle, and there is no other economic activity in that part of the country. It is a matter of survival (for them),” the officer told Kaieteur News.
But he was careful to avoid being definitive.
Last Friday, ranks from the Joint Services swooped down on the gang at their hideout some 300 miles up the Berbice River.
During the confrontation, 21-year-old Otis Fiffee, called Mud Up, was killed while the ranks believe that they wounded others.
One of the fleeing men was identified as wanted man Rondell Rawlins, called ‘Fine Man’. Police said, by way of a press release, that they saw blood along the trail the gunmen used.
They also stated that those who escaped with Rawlins included Richard Ramcharran, called ‘Uncle Willie,’ ‘Magic,’ and ‘Chung Boy’.
The ranks recovered three FN rifles, four shotguns, and a .32 revolver; two AK-47 magazines, seven FN rifle magazines, and several rounds of ammunition from the gunmen’s well-stocked hideout.
According to a statement, the three FN rifles were stolen from the Bartica Police Station during the armed attack on that community on February 17, 2008.
The .32 revolver and two of the shotguns were stolen from the home of Bartica miner Chunilall Babulall.
The Joint Services ranks were said to have also found a diary which provided “incontrovertible evidence” of Rawlins’s planning and execution of the killings at Lusignan and Bartica.
The Police say that the wanted man also planned to take vengeance for the death of his sister, Marcyn King, who was shot dead as she was returning home from her place of employment, on March 10 last.
According to the statement, the diary also contained several telephone numbers.
The officer confirmed that no AK-47 assault rifle, the weapon of choice for the gang, was found, which suggested that those who fled the hideout must have taken those weapons with them.
The officer explained that, upon arrival at the hideout, two armed men were seen running away through a trail. One of them was Fiffee, who was shot dead during the confrontation.
When asked what happened to Fiffee’s weapon, the officer said that it must have been picked up by the other gunman. No bulletproof vests were found during a search of the hideout.
A number of Joint Services ranks have been deployed to the area, and have taken up strategic positions in the dense jungle.
The army’s two surveillance helicopters are also being used in the hunt for the gunmen.
According to a source, the Corentyne River, which separates Guyana from Suriname, is being tightly manned to prevent any escape through that route, while Surinamese officials have been placed on alert.
Two years ago, a similar manhunt was launched in the East Berbice area following the brazen robbery of two commercial banks in the town of Rose Hall.
On that occasion, eight bandits were eventually cornered and killed after several days of high profile tracking by the Joint Services.
“Just as how we managed to capture them after several days, the same will occur this time,” a senior military source assured.
“They (gunmen) have no food, and it will be difficult for them to survive for long,” the source added.
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