Murder/ suicide rocks Non Pareil …Alleged wife beater strangles wife, hangs self

Apr 29, 2014 News

By: Romila Boodram
Eleven years of domestic abuse came to a tragic end late Sunday for a young couple of Non Pareil Housing Scheme, East Coast Demerara.
The usually quiet neighbourhood was rocked by news of a murder/suicide in the community.
Just around 21:00 hrs, relatives found the bodies of 28-year-old Nandanie Mohan, called Michelle and her husband, Vickram Ramdin, 31, in their home at Lot 165 North ‘D’ Non Pareil Housing Scheme.

Dead: Nandanie Mohan called ‘Michelle’, and her husband, Vickram Ramdin

Mohan’s body was found on the couple’s bed with a sheet wrapped around her neck while her husband was discovered dangling from a rafter, just above her.
From all indications, the 31-year-old man had strangled his wife and then hanged himself.
A senior police source said that the couple was supposed to attend the Vigilance Magistrate’s Court yesterday for a domestic matter they had before the court.
“During the investigation, Mohan came and dropped the charges but we have a system where once a domestic matter is dropped, we refer the persons involved to the probation office,” the police official noted.
He added that after reviewing the report from the probation office in front of the parties involved, the Magistrate would then make a decision.
“The two of them had already talked to the probation officer so they only had to come and the Magistrate would have made a decision.”
Yesterday, the dead woman’s mother, Lachmin Mohan, said that she talked to her daughter on numerous occasions to leave her abusive husband but her daughter was too “madly in love”.
The woman said that early Sunday, she tried numerous times to contact her daughter and son-in-law but failed.
“I tried calling but none of them answered so I cooked and I went to bed. I got up back around 18:00hrs and I asked my other daughter if Nandanie called and she said no so I tried calling again but I got no answers so I say to myself that something definitely wrong. I took a taxi and we went to their house,” a still traumatized Mrs. Mohan said.
Accompanied by another daughter and the dead couple’s 11-year-old son, Omardat Ramdin, she went to her daughter’s house.
“The two children does live by me so I carry they son with us. When we reach, the son take a stick and he was hitting the flooring and saying, ‘Mommy, Daddy wake up,’ but no one answered and the place was locked up.”
She added that she started asking neighbours if they saw the couple.
“People say that they see them a little before 06:00hrs on Saturday walking. They say he had an umbrella sheltering her and they were hugging and walking,” the grieving mother recalled yesterday as she sat on a chair at her home with her now dead daughter’s two children beside her.
The seemingly distraught woman added that after talking to neighbours and was heading back to her daughter’s home, she heard a loud scream.
“My daughter got into the house and she tell me that Nandanie dead and deh on the bed and Vickram deh hang up,” the teary mother said.
The police were called in and the bodies were removed from the home.

Mohan parents and her two children

The dead woman’s father, Dudnath Mohan, said that his daughter who got married since she was 16-years-old was beaten on many occasions by her husband.
He said that two years ago his daughter was forced to take up a job at a snackette at the Mon Repos Market because her husband hardly worked.
“He does do mason work and he hardly work. I does take care of he two children since baby. If my daughter talk to him about getting a job, he does start behaving bad and hitting her. Whenever he work and get pay, he does bury his money under the house and don’t gave my daughter any,” Mr. Mohan noted.
He said that last year, on Mashramani Day, his now dead son-in-law held a knife to his daughter’s neck and threatened to kill her, forcing her to jump from her 12 feet high verandah.
“When he get ready, he does cut up the hose from the gas stove and knock up the fridge, denting it. He does take her clothes and burn it and still my daughter refused to leave him,” the dead woman’s father said.
According to the Mohans, their daughter would on many occasions report the matter to the police but would later go and drop all charges against her husband.
“I tell her to leave him but she does ask if he go to jail what will happen to them children and what will happen to her.
“Then she does go and drop the charges. She say she reporting the matter just to frighten him,” the devastated parents said.
A worker at the snackette where Nandanie Mohan worked said that she would go to work in tears on many occasions.
“Up to last Saturday, we talked to her and tell her to leave that man but she don’t listen.”