POLICE, the Guyana Fire Service (GFS) and the Childcare and Protection Agency (CPA) are investigating a suspected case of arson in which an eight-month-old baby died and a house was burnt flat.The tragedy, which occurred at Kaneville, East Bank Demerara early Monday morning, has left eight-month-old Romain Seth dead, and ten persons homeless.

According to a press statement issued by the Guyana Fire Service, “A fire erupted at a home in Kaneville Housing Scheme, resulting in the death of a toddler… Persons in the area reported that it may have been a case of arson.”

When the Guyana Chronicle visited the scene of the fire Monday, the owner of the house, Michelle Menezes related that her family had been threatened by persons in the neighbourhood just the day before, and that their ordeal started around 02:00hrs that morning when balls of fire were thrown into her home.

She said she did not see who threw the fiery objects, but the first landed directly on her grandson, the now diseased baby.

The woman said that try as she and family members might, they couldn’t save the baby, as the netting under which he was sleeping was set ablaze.

The mother of eight said that after realising that their efforts were futile, she and her young children broke the door down and made for her sister’s yard nearby. She said that in her confusion, she even jumped a cousin’s fence and called for help.

HIDDEN GUN
Menezes said it all began two Sundays ago when her children showed her a gun tucked away in a banana sucker in her yard. At the time, she said, a ‘fowl fight’ was in full cry not far away.

“Sunday they had a fowl fight out heah and a young man came and put a gun, a long gun, between the sucker,” Menezes said.
“Dem children did running up and down, and meh son come and he say, ‘Mommy, mommy, come see they got a gun between the sucker!’”

The woman said that ever since that day, a group of persons in the neighbourhood have been after her family, sending them death threats and demanding that they give them back the gun.

She said a man even forced her daughter to give him her Menezes’ cell-phone number so he could call her.

“They call meh phone,” she said. “They ask meh, ‘Wheh yuh deh? Wheh yuh deh? Ah hope yuh ain’t going to the station… because if yuh go, yuh gon see wha we gon do to yuh family.’”

Two days after, when she could take it no more, she went to the Brickdam Police Station in an attempt to make a report but was directed by the Station Sergeant on duty at the Ruimveldt Station instead.

But on second thoughts, Menezes said, she didn’t bother to pursue the matter. “I didn’t go because of fear,” she said.

COME TO A HEAD
Things would, however, come to a head when, on Sunday gone, a young man approached her son, who had just returned from the interior, offering to sell him a cell-phone.

Suspecting that the phone was stolen, her son refused to buy it and an argument ensued, during which he was assaulted.

After the incident was reported to the police, a number of people were held but subsequently sent away.

“So, when the police loose them now,” she said, “one turn and seh he want he gun; that if he can’t get he gun, we gon see wha he gon do wid we. ‘Ah gon kill all al’yuh in deh; ah gon kill all y’all in deh.’”
Again, the matter was reported to the police, this time at the Grove Police Station, but no sooner had that been done than a woman and her son approached her, asking for the gun.

They even began weeding at the back of her yard in an effort to find the gun, so the police had to be called in again, and all those who were involved in the exercise were arrested.

This caused the mother of the young man who’d approached her asking for the gun to accost her, swearing vengeance.
Said Menezes, “She come and tell me, ‘Peter gon pay fuh Paul, and Paul gon pay fuh all; de innocent does pay fuh de guilty.’ And that if anything happen to she son, I gon see wha gon happen to we.”
She said that at the time of the fire, her daughter Holly, whose baby it was that perished, had gone to town with her brother, so she was the only adult at home with the children.

SOMETHING’S AMISS
She said that she suspected that something was amiss when the family dog, ‘Smarty’, began barking and running around frantically all over the yard.

Detailing what transpired, Menezes said: “I come off de bed and going fuh go at the back fuh peep and fuh see; when I near meet the back door, ‘Boof!’ Fire come through, land pon de baby and start burning he.

“So I turn back with the speed now fuh pull he; ‘Boof!’ They send another fire! Me ain’t know if is a ball ah fire or wha! And they send a next fire; I start holler.”