THREE bandits were shot and killed as they attempted to enter the premises of businessman Wayne Heber at Premnaranjan Place, Prashad Nagar yesterday morning. Two of the bandits have been identified as Tony Ogle, aka ‘Skin Teeth’, aged 38; and Leon Gittens, aka ‘Koaw’, aged 27. The third man is as yet unidentified.

Reports are that former Assistant Police Commissioner Steve Merai, at the time reading a newspaper on his verandah, had seen the three men jumping the fence of the businessman’s premises.
Crime Chief, Deputy Commissioner Seelall Persaud, said the police received a tip-off that a robbery was in progress, and rushed to the scene, where they confronted the men, resulting in the shootings.

“We received information that there was a plan to commit a robbery. They (police) went down there and staked them out,” Persaud said. Two of the bandits had their weapons already drawn, Persaud said, but there were no reports of casualties among the lawmen.

The bandits’ bodies were taken to the Georgetown Public Hospital (GPHC), where they all died within an hour of arrival.
After the three men’s bodies had been taken to the mortuary, family members of Leon Gittens said he was at home, at around 9:00 hrs, when a man named O’ Riley Small came and called him.

His reputed wife, who was outside the mortuary wailing, said she told him not to go, but he insisted on going. She said she was at home when she got the news that the police had shot three men in Prashad Nagar, and she immediately went to the GPHC, where she met media personnel and sought to see a picture of the bodies. Whilst scanning through the crime scene pictures from a camera, she identifies her reputed husband.
Asked if they had any children together, she indicated that she has three children.

Police have reportedly recovered from the crime scene a .357 Magnum and a .32 pistol with nine matching rounds.