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Pregnant woman among two shot
– bandit captured in canefield…
Violence erupted in Vryheid’s Lust and Plaisance, East Coast Demerara yesterday after a
Anessa Woolford was shot in her hip.
cornered bandit opened fire wounding two persons, including a pregnant woman.
Luchonda Beckles, 24, was shot in her left leg, while Anessa Woolford, 32, a teacher was also nursing a wound to her hip at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC).
Police in a chase later cornered the bandit in a canefield and in an exchange of gunfire; he was shot in the knee.
Reports are that the captured bandit was one of two men who had allegedly robbed a butcher in the area earlier.
Following the robbery three angry villagers armed with wood and cutlasses followed them.
However, one out of the two bandits was armed with a gun and he opened fire to keep the three pursuers at bay.
In doing so, the bullets ended up hitting Beckles and Woolford.
Beckles’ boyfriend, Jomal Caral, said that he and his girlfriend were walking out from South Vryheids Lust, to attend the Mashramani celebration in Georgetown, when he noticed a car with four men inside, trailing two suspicious looking youths.
“When we reach at the primary school, I see two boys went walking by the Better Hope side (neighboring village) and the car stop. Three men came out de car with cutlasses and wood and them start chase the two boys, one of them saying, ‘y’all robbed me friend, we gon kill you here now’ and them start pursue them.”
“While the men start running them, the long hair boy pull out a gun and start firing shots and that’s how she (Beckles) got shot,” Caral told this newspaper at the GPHC.
He added that he attempted to find a taxi to take his injured girlfriend to the hospital but none was immediately available. It was a police vehicle which eventually rushed the victim to the hospital.
Meanwhile, Woolford was on her verandah in Plaisance where the suspects ran. She too was shot.
Her aunt, Roxanne told Kaieteur News that she was in her house when she heard Wolford’s husband shouting that she was shot. “I don’t know anything… I was downstairs when her husband tell me she got shot.”
Beckles was treated and sent home while the pregnant Wolford is reportedly said to be in theatre, undergoing surgery. Family members said that the unborn child was “alright” up to late last night.
The wounded Luchonda Beckles.
After the women were taken to the hospital, police continued combing the area.
Hours later, the armed bandit, who was hiding in the canfield aback of Vryheid’s Lust, surrendered himself to the police, but not before he was reportedly shot in the knee.
Kaieteur News was told that during his bid to escape, the gunman had hijacked a taxi and this was how police managed to corner him in the canefield area in South Vryheid’s Lust.
The other bandit had escaped but a .32 revolver was recovered.
According to relatives of the two wounded women, the bandits are the main suspects in a robbery last week at a bakery in the area.
The bandit was up to late yesterday still in the hospital under police guard.
Divisional Commander David Ramnarine in an invited comment said that he hopes that the two innocent women who were shot by the criminal are okay and he wished them a speedy recovery.
“It was most unfortunate that they became victims, and based on what is reported to me, I wish to laud the effort of the young man who drove his car and pursued the two suspects after they had robbed him and his mother, despite the fact that the bandits were armed,” Assistant Commissioner Ramnarine told Kaieteur News.
“The courage he displayed, of pursuing them, is not the usual courage we normally see,” he added.
“As Commander, I wish to commend the quick response of our ranks, who in the end apprehended one of the two suspects. I also wish to commend the members of the public who were behind the police the all the way,” Ramnarine stated.
He said that generally speaking, it was noted that the ranks who were led by two gazetted officers with a back up unit from the tactical services unit, were quickly mobilized although it was a holiday yesterday.
They were able to seal off the cane field area ensuring that there was no means of escape for the bandit who was eventually captured.
“Within recent times we have noted that despite a few incidents of serious crimes in the lower East Coast of Demerara, so far, while we have not done an excellent job in apprehending all the suspects, we have arrested a significant number and importantly we have been able to institute charges,” Ramnarine said.
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