Latest update April 4th, 2025 6:13 AM
2010 Canje murder…Mom fearful migration of key witnesses may hamper probe
Having waited seven years for the cops to find the persons who killed her son – Roy Mitchell Persaud –
Dead: Roy Mitchell Persaud
and burnt his body in the trunk of his car, Shira Tahal believes that it might now be difficult for the cops to find the suspects.
Tahal says that the police waited so long to act, that three of the key witnesses who could have identified Persaud’s killers have migrated. Among them is an individual who saw the three suspects driving the 36-year-old man’s vehicle the night he went missing.
Additionally, these were the same persons who hired him from the New Amsterdam car park on that fateful night—he never returned after leaving with the three young men.
“I don’t know what they (police) can get now. One of the boys who had information, left Guyana to work in one of the islands,” an upset Tahal related.
Tahal believes that had the cops done their job from the inception, her son’s murder could have been solved.
The burnt body of Roy Persaud was found in the trunk of his car at Palmyra, Canje, on May 9, 2010, two days after he left home to ply his trade as a taxi driver. One of the suspects in the murder is the son of a police rank. This individual and two other men were the ones seen driving Persaud’s car the night he vanished. Drivers at the New Amsterdam Park also gave statements to seeing the trio entering the man’s car.
A friend of Persaud informed his relatives that he saw the three young men driving the man’s vehicle—this caught his attention because they were driving on the wrong side of the road and when he (friend) peeped into the car, he did not see Persaud.
“We want justice. It is time we get justice, but the police have to act fast before the other witnesses leave the country. I don’t know if it is because it’s a police rank’s son that is why they are doing nothing,” Tahal lamented.
She explained that her son had come from Trinidad to fix his children’s passports and during that time, he was working in the nights and taking care of his children during the day.
Recalling what transpired, the woman said that her son left home on the night of May 07, 2010, and never returned.
“I went and look around and asked people, but no one saw him…and the Sunday, I get a call
The dead man’s mother, Shira Tahal.
that a car was found burnt and I went to the station and informed the police, and they told me that they knew,” the woman said, while adding that it was Mother’s Day.
According to Tahal, relatives were able to identify the vehicle as the one Persaud was driving. The chassis number on the burnt car also matched the taxi-driver’s vehicle.
Scraps of the blue denim jeans that the father of two was wearing when he left home were also found.
Shira Tahal says that after her son was laid to rest, she received information about his demise from several persons but never went to the police station, because of the way she was treated in the initial stages of the probe.
The woman indicated that they had received information that the men may have killed Persaud for two artificial gold chains he was wearing at the time.
It is believed that Persaud was asked to transport the men to an isolated area where the passenger sitting behind the driver strangled him. His body was then placed in the truck of the vehicle and taken to another area where the car was set on fire.
His mother is desperately seeking justice and plans on meeting with Crime Chief, Wendell Blanhum, to gain some perspective on the status of the case.
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