Eyewitness identifies men who beat Cuyuni miner to death

Apr 22, 2013 News

By Michael Jordan

A 20-year-old miner yesterday recounted seeing John Darwin Mc Pherson take his last breath after being abducted, bound, beaten and repeatedly drenched by a group of men at Oku Backdam, Cuyuni, two Wednesdays ago.

Alleged eyewitness: Daniel Henry

Dead: John Darwin Mc Pherson

Daniel Henry, the alleged eyewitness, told Kaieteur News that he identified the men to police while they were all in custody at the Bartica Police Station. However, the suspects were all released on $100,000 station bail without charges. Mc Pherson’s mother said she has filed a complaint at the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), while vowing to do all in her power to ensure that her son’s killers do not escape justice.
Yesterday, a police official confirmed that the suspects were no longer in custody, but stated that police are still investigating Mc Pherson’s death and are attempting to locate three other men. According to the official, investigators are trying to ascertain who exactly inflicted the fatal injuries and are also awaiting a report from the pathologist.
A death certificate viewed by Kaieteur News gave Mc Pherson’s cause of death as asphyxiation and also stated that he had compression injuries to the neck.
Reports indicate that 25-year-old Mc Pherson was beaten at the orders of a dredge owner who had accused the Plum Park, Sophia resident of being the mastermind behind an attempt to steal gold from his camp.
Kaieteur News was told that the dredge owner who ordered Mc Pherson’s abduction had caught a miner from Mc Pherson’s camp on his claim two Wednesdays ago. The crewmen allegedly relieved the intruder of a firearm, and after being beaten and interrogated, the miner reportedly identified Mc Pherson and two others as his accomplices.
At the time, Mc Pherson was working at another dredge owner’s camp located some 15 minutes away.
Mc Pherson’s employer described him as a good worker while expressing doubt that the man who has worked with him for two years, was part of any criminal activity.
“He was a good boy. I doubt that he had anything to do with it.” The employer also said that the dredge owner informed him that nothing was stolen, although the owner of the claim had alleged that someone had tampered with a piece of mesh covering a container where raw gold is collected.
Daniel Henry, the alleged eyewitness, said that about 14 men, including the dredge owner, accompanied by his General Manager arrived in a truck at their camp.
Kaieteur News was told the intruders then bounded Mc Person and Henry, hand and foot, and took them back to their camp, where they still held captive the miner who had entered their camp. Henry said that after learning that Mc Pherson had worked with his employer for the longest period, the dredge owner concluded that Mc Pherson had planned the robbery.
“They ask me how long I work with (name given) and I say six weeks and Darwin say he work with (name of dredge owner) for about two years and they say Darwin is the mastermind. Darwin bring me and the other boy.”
According to Henry, they were then subjected to some three hours of torture. “They start beating us…we say that we don’t know anything and they still beating us. They beat us with hose, wood, cutlass, rope and iron,” added Henry, who said that his legs were badly swollen and one of his fingers appears to have been broken.
The miner alleged that their captors then strapped them to two All-Terrain Vehicles while indicating that they would hand them over to the police. By then, Mc Pherson was reportedly close to death, but even then, one of the men continued to strike the bound and barely conscious man, while telling him to “ketch yuhself.”
According to the eyewitness, Mc Pherson “couldn’t make it anymore,” and the men eventually stopped at Oku, Cuyuni, where they began to dip water from rapids in the location and repeatedly throw water in the dying man’s face.
“They start throwing water on him and saying ‘ketch yuhself, water is life.’” Henry said that it was during this ordeal that he saw his colleague take his last breath.
“The bossman and the GM and the cook come off the bikes and they say ‘we done deh in it, wha we gun do with the next two?’”
Henry said that the men eventually headed to an area known as Brian Road. Police ranks then arrived at the area and took all the men, including Henry into custody at the Bartica Police Station.
The miner said that he identified two of the men who had beaten him and his colleagues and the ranks also detained two other men from the camp. He identified the culprits as the camp cook and another individual with a slightly deformed right arm.
Nevertheless, the suspects were all released on $100,000 bail each. Henry said that he was also released without charges, and Kaieteur News understands that the miner who was allegedly found on the dredge owner’s camp with a firearm was also released.
McPherson’s mother, Barbara James, told Kaieteur News that an attorney accompanied her to the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, where she gave a statement.
“I am going as far as it takes. I need justice for my son. My son is not a thief. My son’s death will not be another figure,” Ms. James said yesterday.
And McPherson’s employer also expressed surprise that the men who allegedly killed his worker had been released. The dredge owner said that he was at the Bartica Police Station when Henry positively identified the suspects. “I was there when they took statements and he told them what happened.”
He also alleged that the dredge owner who had allegedly ordered Henry to be brutalized had contacted him and said “one of your men collapse and dead and see what you can do.”
Mc Pherson’s boss, who was in Georgetown when his worker was killed, also expressed concern that the dredge owner, whom he described as being “like a neighbour” (the camps are a relatively short distance away) should have taken such drastic action, particularly since he claimed that nothing was stolen.
“They should have informed me. We are like neighbours; if they want anything (for their camp) they would come to me, and likewise I would do the same.”
The dredge owner disclosed that McPherson sustained a broken hand last December and had to spend the Christmas holidays in the city.
“By the hand was not well, I paid him to just grease the machine. If I knew he was not a good man, I would not have taken him back into the backdam?”