The saga of Elizabeth Shivpersaud

Apr 20, 2026 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

Kaieteur News – It’s one of those situations crying out for help. The best I can do, other than offering professional help, is to raise an alarm about a case that is worrying in all of its elements. It’s the Saga of Elizabth Shivpersaud. If this distressed, shorthanded, hollow-eyed, hazy-headed, female Guyanese wife and mother is not in need of expert medical counsel and care, then who does?

Reports are that not knowing what to do, after being abandoned by her partner, she strangled one of her children. Rare are the mothers, however despairing, that devour their young. But Ms. Elizabeth Shivpersaud did, and she cannot even remember doing so. The death toll would have been higher had she succeeded in smothering another young child of hers, as reported by a grandmother. Ms. Shivpersaud failed at that attempt on taking another life. She also failed at taking her own life, had to be rushed to the hospital. She has now been slapped with a murder charge and packed off to jail.

Something is wrong here, and one doesn’t need to be a health professional, or a social worker, to arrive there. What started out as financial distress seems to have had too much of a foundation in domestic distress. The combining of the two is dangerous in the best situations and with the strongest individuals, meaning, women and those with little children to care for. In aggregate, the circumstances are but a short step from mental distress. I invite Guyanese to return and reexamine the sequence of actions that led to Ms. Elizabeth Shivpersaud now being a nationally known name, and a woman and mother confined to jail.

Her partner departed and there was some knowledge, or confirmation, that he was gone and not coming back to the marital home. In tight situations that, by itself, would be enough to send some off the deep end. We have encountered some of those victims on the streets, haven’t we? I have. Then, it was that worry, that failure, about not having food for the family, which some persons have difficulty managing. The results are like a lash across the face: one child dead, another barely escaped, and Ms. Shivpersaud herself not wanting to live anymore. How can there not be sympathy for this young mother, this abandoned partner? Without second-guessing, or one bad word for, the experts involved in handling her matter, I think that this is a situation that cries out for another look, another review; one that looks at the harsh pileup of her circumstances that led to her smashing blindly and lethally at her own loved ones.

Frankly, this woman does not belong in jail. Jail may be the absolute worst place for her. Ms. Shivpersaud needs understanding hearts and caring hands to lift her out of the dark world that she now inhabits. I don’t think, for a moment, that hers is a case of putting on a show and trying to get around the system. If I may be pardoned, I think that she is one sick individual. She needs a bed and special attention in another kind of facility and not a bed in a jail cell. Could she not have been released to the supervision of relatives? Would she be a danger to her remaining offspring, her family members, her community or herself? In other words, is she a walking timebomb waiting to explode in another episode of sudden, uncontrolled violence? I am positive that there are others who are far better than I can ever be at answering those questions. And that there may be some relative of hers who may be ready to step forward and take responsibility for her.

A spot in jail seems to me to be the last and worst place for her. I think that there are enough caring people in government and the public service, who can think of better ways of helping her. This is said against the backdrop of a dead child and one traumatized, most likely scarred for a long time to come. The hope is for some kind of intervention and a swift reconsideration of her presence in jail. We can do better. Ms. Shivpersaud’s circumstances demand this happening quickly. I think that the Human Services Ministry would be a good starting place.

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despairing, distressed, Elizabeth Shivpersaud, financial distress, hospital, shorthanded

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