Dead Bristols leave suspicions in their wake

Sep 27, 2011 News

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It is just sheer coincidence that just one year after businesswoman Learia Bristol was executed as she was entering her South Ruimveldt Home, her daughter and only child Shakese Bristol, 14, and sole beneficiary of her divorce proceedings and life insurance has died under mysterious circumstances.
The 14-year-old who suffered from Cerebral palsy died last Sunday at a private medical institution.
Cerebral Palsy is defined as the umbrella term encompassing a group of non-progressive, non-contagious motor conditions that cause physical disability in human development, chiefly in the various areas of body movement.

Close relatives of the woman have stated that both child and the mother had life insurances and a close male relative stands to gain everything now that they are both dead.
Kaieteur News was told that relatives also suspect a close blood relative of having knowledge about the businesswoman’s killing.
This newspaper was told that one week before the businesswoman’s death the court had awarded her during a divorce hearing two-thirds of the couple’s belongings, while the male relative got the remainder.
According to the woman’s relatives the male had tried to convince Bristol to give him more but she had refused. She was expected to collect her absolute from the courts the same week she died.
Further, relatives also disclosed that the woman had a $2M life insurance. It was explained that the sole beneficiary for that was Bristol’s daughter and another close female relative.
Relatives are unclear if the money was paid out by the insurance company and who received the money if it was paid out.
Relatives got more suspicious last week when the teenager died. According to relatives it was just by luck that they became aware that the teen was hospitalized.
According to relatives they were denied the right to see the child on September 18 last. She died the same day at a private medical institution.
Relatives were told that the child accidentally fell and broke her ribs which later punctured her lungs. This, according to relatives, left them puzzled since according to them the child needed to fall from some height to sustain that kind of injury.
Unconfirmed reports yesterday hinted that no post mortem was done on the child to verify that she indeed died from a “fall”. Just like her mother, the child also had a life insurance.
Grieving relatives yesterday told Kaieteur News that soon after the businesswoman’s death, relatives were denied the right to see the child.
“We would usually go to the babysitter ….but after a close male relative of the child found out, he stopped it,” one relative told Kaieteur News.
This newspaper was further told that several attempts to contact the child at school were thwarted by the same male relative.
Meanwhile relatives also pointed to another closed blood related relative who might have had something to do with the woman’s death.
On the evening of August 4, 2010, Bristol’s niece Shumaine Archer heard a car stop in front of her aunt’s Lot 285 Well Road, North Ruimveldt home shortly before 21:00 hrs. She had surmised that this meant that her aunt, Learia Bristol, had returned from church. The woman according to relatives seldom walked with her keys, and it would sometimes be left to Shumaine or one of the other occupants to open the door.
Then Shumaine heard something else…three explosive sounds that reminded her of firecrackers.
But then she heard a tumbling in the upper flat, and her aunt’s boyfriend bolted down the stairs leading to the bottom flat where Shumaine was sitting.
Forty-two year-old Learia Bristol lay motionless on her bridge in a rapidly spreading pool of blood. She had been shot at close range behind the right ear. She was pronounced dead on arrival Georgetown Public Hospital.
Crime Chief Seelall Persaud had told Kaieteur News that the killing took the pattern of a “hit”.
The killers had fled without taking any of the victim’s jewellery and other valuables. And in this case, there were suspects aplenty.
Bristol, known as ‘Big L’, was a successful businesswoman who owned Bristol’s Electronics and Vintage Variety Store in Robb Street.
Relatives had disclosed that the former property owner had sold the building to Bristol around 2000 after encountering financial problems.
But it is alleged that a local bank somehow sold the same premises to another business entity. Bristol took the matter to the High Court, which ruled in her favour.
The other person in the dispute appealed. Bristol was allegedly gunned down a few days before the appeal was scheduled to be heard.

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