Crane man suffers skull fracture during altercation with soldier

Jun 18, 2017 News

A 57-year-old man is voicing his displeasure at the manner in which the Police at the Crane Police Station are investigating a matter of assault against him.

Linden Hastings at the hospital

Linden Hastings, called ‘Bilaal’ of Lot 374 Crane Housing Scheme, West Coast Demerara, said that on June 3, last, he went to the Mosque to pray. There he met a young soldier who is a frequent visitor at the Mosque.
Hastings said that while at the Mosque he saw the young man and a woman sitting in the male section. He said that he asked that the young woman leave the mosque since she is not a Muslim, and she complied.
Hastings stated that after the soldier and the young woman went outside he, too, decided to go outside. “I left and went outside to perform ‘wudu’ which is a ritual washing performed in preparation for prayers.
“While I was outside the soldier approached me from behind and started verbally abusing me.”
Hastings said that the man told him he needed to watch how he was talking to him and his girlfriend “or else he gone deal with me.”
Hastings said that after he heard those words he decided to turn around and that is when the soldier dealt him several cuffs to his face. “Soon as I turn around he give me one cuff to my left eye.
“When I get the cuff to my eye I tried to run but he advance towards me and started hitting my head to the wall.” Hastings said that after he fell to the ground the soldier stomped him to his head several times until he passed out.
At that time, Hastings’s wife who was in the upper floor of the Mosque, upon hearing the commotion ran downstairs to help her husband. She reached just to see him lying motionless on the ground.
The woman said that she had to stop a car and with the assistance of the taxi driver put her husband in the vehicle. They then rushed him to the West Demerara Regional Hospital.

Linden Hastings

The woman said that due to her husband’s condition she was advised by nurses at the hospital to rush him to the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation.
At the (GPHC) her husband was admitted and she was instructed to make a report about the incident to the police.
She then went to the Vreed-en-Hoop police station where the police took a statement from her.
The woman said that after giving her statement she was accompanied by two ranks to the soldier’s home. They were told by the mother that she did not know his whereabouts.
The woman said that her husband had to undergo several tests, one being a CT scan which showed that he sustained a fractured skull.
The man said that after he was discharged from the hospital he was accompanied by his wife to the station where he gave the police a statement on what transpired.
“Just imagine I nearly dead; the police have all the information about this man and they can’t find him up to now. They are dragging their feet. I need justice, I am in pain and I am fearful for my life.”

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