Colin Clarke’s murder: Carjacking or execution?

Mar 19, 2017 Features / Columnists, Murder and Mystery

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By Michael Jordan

From what his friends and family told me last week, taxi driver Colin Clarke made quite a

few fatal errors on Friday, November 27, 2015.
First, he picked up a tall, fair-complexioned, dreadlocked man near a bar at the Vreed-en-Hoop Stelling, even though he had felt uneasy about this passenger, who had hired him earlier that day.
Second, as had happened on the earlier trip, Clarke allowed his passenger, who had a strange accent, to sit in the back seat of the shiny Toyota Allion he was driving.
But that passenger had given Clarke $5,000 for that first trip to the East Bank of Essequibo. Perhaps it was the thought of making another $5,000 that made the 57-year-old Clarke less cautious than he should have been.
Clarke, known as ‘Ole Boy’, lived at his sister’s home in Crane Housing Scheme, West Coast Demerara. He had worked as a mini-bus driver for several years, but in the latter part of 2015, a woman, with whom Clarke had a previous relationship, hired him to drive her Toyota Allion, HC 4993. From reports, he would return the car every night at seven.
But on the night of Friday, November 27, 2015, the woman contacted Clarke’s sister to enquire about Clarke’s whereabouts, since he had not returned the vehicle. Clarke’s relatives were unable to contact him, since he had no cell phone.
The following day, one of Clarke’s sisters contacted a close friend of Clarke’s and informed the friend that her brother was missing. The friend became alarmed.
The previous day, Clarke had told the friend that he was soliciting passengers near the Vreed-en-Hoop Stelling when a tall, fair-complexioned man with dreadlocks and “plenty gold teeth” attempted to hire him. Because the man had “a funny accent”, Clarke had said that he found it difficult to make out what the man was saying, and asked a female taxi driver to take the passenger.
The woman reportedly took the man to Crane, West Coast Demerara, and the man reportedly paid her $1,000.
Later that day, the same man reportedly approached Clarke and asked to be taken to Tuschen, East Bank Essequibo. Clarke reportedly agreed, and told the friend that the man sat in the back seat. Since he felt uneasy, the taxi driver reportedly suggested that the passenger sit next to him.
“I like sit in the back seat,” the passenger reportedly retorted.

On arriving at their destination, Clare reportedly took the passenger to a back street in another community. The man exited and spoke on his cell phone, while flashing several five thousand-dollar notes. Clarke reportedly became even more suspicious, and exited his car and began to converse with some men who were working nearby, to give the passenger the impression that he knew the men.
Later, the passenger reportedly stopped near a house and engaged in a heated conversation with a woman. He then returned to the car and Clarke took him back to Vreed-en-Hoop, where the passenger gave Clarke $5,000.
At around 3.00 p.m. that same day, the same passenger reportedly approached Clarke and requested to be taken back to Tuschen. Clarke reportedly picked him up…then disappeared.
On Thursday, December 3, 2015, six days after Colin Clarke’s disappearance, residents of Uitvlugt, on an early morning stroll, detected a foul smell in the vicinity of a bridge.  The villagers alerted the police, and soon after, they pulled a man’s decomposed body from beneath the bridge.
The victim was Colin Clarke…and he had suffered a cruel death.
The murder weapon was a strip of barbed wire, with sticks tied at both ends. The killer had drawn this improvised weapon so tightly around his victim’s throat that flesh was left embedded in it.
But where was the victim’s car?
That mystery was solved a week later, when the Toyota Allion was discovered under a house at Perth, Mahaicony, East Bank Demerara. While the licence plates were missing, the vehicle was intact.
The house was occupied by an elderly couple. The elderly male occupant told investigators that a man had brought the car to the house and had asked the resident to keep it, until he returned from Suriname. Because the man was an acquaintance of his son, who was out of the country, the homeowner agreed.
But after weeks passed and the man failed to return to collect the car, the homeowner became suspicious and contacted the police.
Detectives also found Clarke’s driver’s licence in the vehicle. They also reportedly observed bloodstains in the back seat, and this led them to believe that Clarke had wounded his attacker.
Clarke is said to have always carried a sharp ‘chopper’ in his vehicle in the event of being attacked.
Police reportedly have a name and description of the individual who left the vehicle at Mahaicony. But he bears no resemblance to the “tall, fair, dreadlocked man with gold teeth” that allegedly hired Clarke on the day he was slain.
This other man is said to be tall, dark, and with’ full’ eyes.
When he had met with Clarke’s mother and sisters in 2015, former Commander of the Police West Demerara Division, Stephen Mansell had assured them that investigators were working on a few leads and hoped to make a breakthrough. That breakthrough has not come, although police have reportedly assured Clarke’s relatives that they know the prime suspect’s identity. This suspect is believed to be the same individual who left the car at Mahaicony.
Meanwhile, some of Clarke’s relatives have suggested that he was not a victim of a carjacking. There are some hints that jealousy over a woman could have led someone to hire the individual who killed Clarke.
“This killing is a ‘set-up,’ this is no robbery,” one relative told me. “The people (owners) get back their car intact.”
One sister, however, suggested that the individual who killed her brother may also have murdered Shurland Dalloo, a taxi driver who was slain a month prior to Clarke being killed.
Dalloo’s decomposed body was found one week after he went missing in a canal at Onverwagt, Number 27, West Coast Berbice, a few miles from where Clarke’s car was recovered. Dalloo also operated on the West Coast Demerara, but was based at Parika. His car, a silver-grey Toyota Carina, has not been recovered.
If you have any further information on this case or any other, please contact us at our Lot 24 Saffon Street, Charlestown office or by telephone.

We can be reached on telephone numbers 22-58458, 22-58465, or 22-58491. You need not disclose your identity.
You can also contact Michael Jordan at his email addresses: [email protected]; or [email protected]

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