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Overseas-based Guyanese condemn Kelvin Fraser killing
– express fears for their families back home
Several overseas-based Guyanese have condemned the police killing of 16-year-old Kelvin Fraser. They have stated that the incident shows clearly the lack of professional training within the Guyana Police Force.
The view was expressed that in order to provide a proper service to the citizenry of Guyana, the Police need more training in dealing with issues such as the one that led to the shooting of the West Bank Demerara teenager.
Kelvin Fraser
One man in New York exclaimed, “The police are to serve and protect, instead they act as judge, jury and executioners!”
Another stated that actions like these by members of the Force set a bad trend, adding that the little respect that the GPF had fought hard to regain over the past years can soon go down the drain again if the situation is not handled properly.
Yet another Guyanese living in Washington added that, “This will make matters worse for the Guyana Police Force. It makes people in the US get a sense of unease for their loved ones back home.”
Pointing to the phone call that led to the police team being sent out, the Guyanese stated that if indeed it was the Head of the School that made the call, she would or should have been aware that some of the group would be students of her school. “They should pressure her to resign. It’s her fault that this happened,” the man stated, adding that the initial situation was one that could have been handled by the HM and other staff members of the school.
Nonetheless, it was the inability of the teaching staff to handle the situation that forced the call to the Police.
And yet it has been stated by one person in Toronto that the armed response by the police was uncalled for. “It is a disgusting and distasteful image of the Guyana Police to respond with weapons to a report that a bunch of teenagers are gambling near a school,” one woman, a teacher in Canada declared.
One teenager living in England stated that “There should be calls for the police who did the shooting to resign and face criminal charges for use of excessive force when it was not necessary.”
Another Guyanese living in Florida was saddened that, “Incidents like these are commonplace as far as I’m concerned, nothing changes in Guyana.”
He added, “It is very sad, people are killed daily and the society is rotten to the core, the rich gets richer by any means, the others fend as best as they can by any means.”
Sixteen-year-old Kelvin Anthony Fraser was shot in the neck at close range, according to an autopsy on Friday. The findings revealed that the shotgun blast struck the 16-year-old in the left side of the neck. He sustained a broken left collarbone, several broken ribs, and laceration to the left lung. He died of shock and haemorrhage. Twenty shotgun pellets, as well as wadding from the shotgun cartridge, were removed from the lad’s remains. There was no exit wound.
Kaieteur News understands that the police Constable who shot Fraser alleged that he accidentally discharged his firearm during a scuffle with the Patentia Secondary School student, whom he was trying to arrest. Police have said that Fraser was fatally shot on Monday while ranks were responding to a report of a group of men “molesting” female students at the Patentia Secondary School.
They alleged that ranks responded and upon arrival, six youths were pointed out as the perpetrators.
On seeing the police, four of the youths ran away while two were arrested. The ranks pursued the four youths and caught up with Kelvin Fraser at Third Street, Patentia Housing Scheme, where he was shot.
Fraser was pronounced dead on arrival at the West Demerara Regional Hospital. Political activists have joined with the slain youth’s relatives and colleagues in protesting outside the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Brickdam Police Station to demand that the rank be charged.
On Thursday, Minister of Education, Shaik Baksh, also strongly condemned the shooting, and promised that a full investigation would be conducted.
Kelvin Fraser will be laid to rest today.
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