Killer may have hired slain taxi driver

Feb 01, 2011 News

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Taxi driver Charles Caesar may have been slain by a passenger who lured him to dark and deserted Perry Street, Tucville on Sunday night before shooting him in his car.
Police sources confirmed yesterday that 24-year-old Caesar, of 187 Garnett Street, Albouystown, was shot at close range just below the left armpit. Investigators said the size of the wound suggests that the killer used a .32 revolver.

While investigations are still at the preliminary stage, initial reports suggest that robbery was the motive for the killing.
Kaieteur News understands that police who visited the scene after being summoned by residents found Caesar’s car ransacked. Two of the slain man’s mobile phones, including a Blackberry, are missing and no money was found on the victim or in his car.  A sister said she was told that his car keys were also missing.
Residents of Perry Street, Tucville told Kaieteur News that Caesar was found lying outside his Toyota, PKK 6385. He was still alive. But before breathing his last, he managed to tell persons who came to his aid that two men had attacked him. Relatives said that Caesar owns the vehicle that he was driving, and had been working with Ezee Runnings Taxi Service for about a year.
A source told Kaieteur News that a man came to the taxi service’s Lot 46 Sheriff Street, Campbellville base shortly before 23:00 hrs on Sunday and asked Caesar if he was working. Caesar indicated that he was and the passenger entered the front passenger seat.
Caesar then drove south along Sheriff Street.
“That was the last time we saw him,” the source said. Kaieteur News was told that dispatchers at the taxi service made several attempts to contact Caesar on his radio set but got no response.
Management at the taxi service said that they only learned of the tragedy after Kaieteur News contacted them yesterday morning.

GUNSHOT AND GROANS HEARD
A Perry Street resident told Kaieteur News that she heard a gunshot shortly after 20:30 hrs on Sunday, but did not look outside. She then heard someone groaning but assumed that the sounds were being made by her mother, who suffers from hypertension.
But then another relative alerted her that a white car was parked at the southern end of Perry Street.
The woman said that before they could go to the scene, two men came from a nearby alley and went to the vehicle. The men then indicated that the driver was lying on the ground near the front passenger door.
She said that the driver was still alive and said that two men had attacked him.
According to the woman, another relative summoned an ambulance and police ranks from the East La Penitence Police Station.  Caesar is believed to have succumbed before arriving at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation.
The slain man’s sister, Carolyn Caesar-Murray, said that police were able to identify her brother from his passport and other documents that were found in his car.
Mrs. Caesar-Murray and other relatives only learned of the tragedy around midnight after Kaieteur News visited the family’s Garnett Street, Albouystown home after learning of the shooting.
She subsequently identified the body.
The distraught woman recalled that her brother’s wife, Shibiki Caesar, and eight-year-old daughter had spent the weekend at her Albouystown residence.
Charles Caesar reportedly spoke to his wife at around 16:00 hrs on Sunday. According to the sister, he informed his wife that he was working late and could not pick her up.
Asked about a possible motive, the sister said that her sibling, who played cricket regularly at the National Park, had no enemies and as far as she was aware, had never been threatened by anyone.
“He was the nicest person…the kindest person. He would go the distance for you and not ask for anything in return. He had no problems with anyone.”
Caesar’s employer described him as “an honest and decent person.”
“He’s not the sort of person who would have a problem with anyone,” the employer added.
In a bizarre coincidence, the owner of Ezee Runnings Taxi Service was himself slain during a robbery last year January.
Thirty-three-year-old Davin Bholanauth, of Owen Street, Kitty, was shot in the chest when two gun-toting robbers barged into his Sheriff Street office.
Eyewitness had said that Bholanauth was “hooking up the internet on his laptop” when two young men, who appeared to be no more than 17 years old, came up to the office and enquired about Digicel credit.
One of the men then pressed a gun to the businessman’s chest and ordered him to hand over the laptop.
But Bholanauth reportedly held onto the computer and a struggle ensued, during which the businessman was shot.
The killers fled in a waiting car after relieving Bholanauth of the computed and a gold chain. Bholansingh died without regaining consciousness a few days later.
His killers are still at large although one of them is suspected to be a man in police custody charged with two murders.

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