Shot-in-mouth teen “refuses $1M settlement”

May 07, 2014 News

By Romila Boodram
The teenager who was shot in the mouth two Wednesdays ago by a Cadet Officer has reportedly refused to accept $1M offered to him as settlement by a number of the suspect’s close associates.
Alex Griffith was yesterday discharged from the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) after being shot in his mouth.
Griffith, of North East La Penitence, was shot a stone’s throw away from his home by a rank attached to ‘C’ Division.
The policeman along with three of his colleagues had gone to area to investigate a robbery committed on a female relative of the said policeman.

Mark Benschop speaking to the teenager and his mother yesterday at his office

During a press conference yesterday with the teen, his mother, Marcel along with Social and Political Activist, Mark Benschop, stated that a number of persons have telephoned the teen’s mother and offered her money to settle the matter.
Among those who called was someone identifying himself as a lawyer, and pleading with the mother to accept the settlement.
“I am a grieving mother. My son doesn’t know anything about that robbery and although people tell these policemen that my son is innocent, they still beat my son and shoot him,” the woman said.
She further added that even though she pleaded with the ranks not to kick her son in his abdomen, they still did.
The woman said two of the policemen held her down while the other two proceeded to brutalize the teen.
The mother expressed her concerns about her son’s safety since, according to her, a number of persons have been calling and demanding that she settle the matter outside the court.
“I am scared because I don’t know who is who. Strange people were visiting my son at the hospital, including one of the policemen who harassed and almost killed him,” the mother exclaimed.
The policeman who visited Alex Griffith while he was a patient at the hospital revealed during a telephone interview with Benschop that he had only gone to the hospital to check whether the teen was out of danger.
Asked what triggered his colleague to shoot the teen, the rank said he is still trying to figure out what went wrong that night.
During the telephone interview, the content of which this publication managed to obtain, the policeman said, “I don’t know what happen to him (suspect). The Devil must have taken over, because nobody expected he woulda shoot. I am still trying to figure out what happened.”
Kaieteur News was reliably informed that the suspect who is attached to the Mahaica Police Station breached the office regulations by keeping the police weapon in his possession for more than 24 hours.
A senior official said the policeman uplifted the gun on April 22, last. It was never booked out until the teen was shot eight days later.
“The question is what he was doing with this weapon so long,” the senior official questioned.
According to the official, on the night of the shooting, the officer in question along with a party of policemen went to the Mahaica Police Station from St. Cuthbert’s Mission after completing an investigation.
It was while at the station he received a telephone call after which he immediately left the station. He reportedly went to the East La Penitence Police Station, collected three ranks, and went to the scene.
Yesterday, Benschop questioned why only the shooter is under close arrest when the three other ranks also assaulted the teen.
“This boy has been discharged from the hospital. He has no proper care, and one of my concerns is that the police should take responsibility; knowing that he was shot by one of their own, they should have taken care of him medically,” Benschop related.
He further questioned the reason for the Crime Chief saying that they are proceeding with the investigation to see whether the suspect’s intention was to shoot.
“Anyone who puts a gun in someone’s mouth, knowing there is a bullet, there is only one intention and that is to shoot!” Benschop stressed.
According to the activist, the policeman should be charged with attempted murder.
Recalling what happened on that fateful night, the teen explained that just after he reached home after a hard day at work, he went to purchase plantain chips from a nearby shop.
“When I buy my chips, it had a movie showing, so I sit down and was watching a movie and then I hear a li’l girl who does live there come and say a girl just get robbed and everybody go behind she, but nobody ain’t see is who…only the li’l girl see,” the teen recalled.
He said after the commotion ended, he continued looking at the movie after which he went home.
“I reach home a little after 9 o’clock and li’l after a man come and holler for me and say that I know something about what happen, and then three policemen come and ask about the robbery…so I tell them that I didn’t see anything, but a li’l girl see. They ask me to carry them and I take them.”
He added that while taking the policemen to locate the “eyewitness”, the Cadet Officer hit him in his abdomen with his torch light.
“When we reach, I show them the li’l girl and she tell them what she see and she even describe the clothing the two thieves wore, but the police still carry me at the back and start beating me. They stand on my foot, and stamped me,” Griffith recounted.
He said that the policemen then dumped him in their van and drove a short distance before they came to a stop. “They ask me to come out and he (suspect) take out the bullets from his gun and gave it to another policeman, and then he tek another bullet and put it in the gun.”
The 15-year-old said that the first time the rank cranked the gun, it did not go off but it did the second time.
He was then taken to the hospital, after which his mother was notified by a nurse at the health institution.
The teen and his mother are determined and said that they will not accept compensation. “If any form of compensation is accepted, it will be in the courts.”

1 thoughts on “Shot-in-mouth teen “refuses $1M settlement””

george wiltshire August 30, 2016 at 3:46 am

How has this matter progressed ? I think that the teen should be given more than thirty million. Trust that the press is following this matter. By the time this guy gets compensation he will be well over thirty and his parents may be dead. What a country?