Father hacks children to death, wife critical

Aug 01, 2013 News

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By Romila Boodram and Javone Vickerie
Several hours after one of the most gruesome attacks in recent times at Zeelugt Squatting Area, East Bank Essequibo, relatives as well as residents of the area were still trying to grapple with the fact that two innocent children were hacked to death by their father and their mother is battling for her life.
Five-year-old Kimberley Houston and her little brother, two-year-old Tarif Lord were brutally chopped to death around 06:00pm yesterday at their home, which is located at the back of their grandmother, Bibi Khairool Houston’s lot 864 Zeelugt Squatting Area house.

Up to press time last night, doctors at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPGC) were battling to save the life of 21-year-old Bibi Nazarena Houston whose right hand was severed and her fingers from her left hand were cut-off.
The woman somehow managed to survive the savage cutlass attack by her 26-year-old reputed husband Richard Lord, but her faith will be decided in the next few hours. It is unclear what led the 26-year-old man to brutally murder his children. The injured woman’s relatives said that the man was very jealous and he recently accused her of cheating on him with another man from the village.
According to the woman’s mother, her daughter eloped with the accused since she was 14 years old and ever since then; her life has been a “living hell.”
“He does always say she deh with this body and that body. She can’t even get pictures with herself, all the pictures them he burn. He destroy her ID (Identification Card); is only recently she went and apply back for one and she had to leave it by me,” the elderly Houston said.
The woman explained that last Wednesday, her daughter and her husband had an argument and he chopped her on her body. “He beat her and chopped her on Wednesday, and Friday he left to go to work and my daughter packed her bags, call a taxi and left with the children. Before she left, she tell me she going at someone at Lallie Street, Zeelugt.”
According to the elderly woman, her daughter did not return home and on Monday she went to the Leonora Police Station and made a missing person report.
“When I finish from the station, I go to Lallie Street to look for her but I didn’t see her or the children so I went home back and I see he (Richard Lord) and he tell me that I hiding secrets for his wife. I tell him that I don’t know anything.”
Houston, who was still in shock when this publication visited her at her home last night, said that someone told her that they saw her daughter roaming with the man she was accused of having an affair with around the area.
“Today (yesterday) I went to the Vreed-en-Hoop Court and my other daughter called me and tell me that she (the injured woman) return home and she is at the back house, so I left and I went home and when I go at the back, I see the two of them sitting on the step so I turn and I say that y’all see how good y’all deh, and y’all does fight so much,” the grieving woman stressed.
According to the woman, later yesterday her granddaughter came to her house and told her that the man was “tormenting her mother. So I left and I go at the back again.”
Khairool Houston added that when she reached at the back house, she called for her daughter, “I called out to her and she tell me that he (Richard) beating her and she face swell up. I tell her to come out the house and he shut the door fast and then I hear she hollering more. I called the police, when I come off the phone, I hear like lashes firing, so I ask my grandson to get me a wood to break the door.”
“When I go on the landing to break the door, he opened the door and pushed me off the landing and run straight at the back with the cutlass. I couldn’t go in the house, but my neighbours go in and them come out back and tell me that the two children done dead,” the woman added.
Neighbours of the victims said that the assailant had a history of physically abusing his wife.
“Up to this morning (Wednesday) we hear he beating she bad and she family ah shout pon him but he is a mad man”, the neighbour said.
The woman added that around 18:00 hrs yesterday she heard the sound of the couple arguing. “I hear he keep telling she ‘yuh lie, yuh lie, yuh been with he, meh gon kill yuh in here today’, but we nah tek it serious because is ah everyday thing”, the woman said.
She added that about 30 minutes after the intense argument, she heard the sound of the children screaming from within the small house. “I hear the lil gal ah scream out ‘daddy done’ and the lil boy screaming suh me seh he beating them,” the woman added.
She stated that after relatives from the front house intervened, she realized that it was more than just a beating. The woman who was obviously shaken, told this publication that after the screaming, there was silence before the overflow of cries from relatives who were startled by the horrifying sight.
“When me go in the house, me see the two children dem lie down pon de ground in the corner. All me could’a do is cry. Dem poor lil children, dem he nah had to do duh,” the woman lamented.
She however blamed last evening’s events on the relatives, adding that the man should have been behind bars a number of years ago. “He is a mad man. Nobody don’t talk to he through here because of how he stay. He had the woman like a child; beat she all over, beat she in front dem pickney. Them should find he and jail he,” the eyewitness said.

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