AS the writer of hundreds of reports on robbery cases emanating from the magistrates courts in Berbice, I thought I had seen and heard it all; but I have never seen anything like the recent daring robbery I witnessed on Regent Street in Georgetown.

Last Friday I left the office of the Guyana Chronicle in Lama Avenue, Bel Air Park, Georgetown to join a waiting car which would transport me back to New Amsterdam; but before I joined the car, I had to do a friend a favour, which required me to walk along Regent Street.
It had rained earlier, and as the sun showed its face during the mid-afternoon period, so did both the shoppers and the robbers.
I was about to cross over Wellington Street when a young man walked past me, jamming my bag in the process. I turned around and noticed a couple carrying several shopping bags walking a few feet behind me. I guess they got the youth’s attention (I presume he was under twenty-five years old) as, within seconds, he sprayed a substance, which I later learnt was pepper spray, into the eyes of the unsuspecting male.
I stood aghast — as did the man’s companion — and witnessed this thief unhurriedly unclasp the man’s gold chain from off his neck as his victim crouched in pain, grasping at his eyes with one hand whilst holding his bags with the other. Mission accomplished in about two minutes, the thief gingerly walked over to the northern side of Wellington Street and disappeared. By then the man’s companion had managed to compose herself but was barely able to utter the words “Thief! Thief!”with no response from anyone.
As I stood in vicinity of the Discount Store, an elderly woman approached me and said, “Girl, these days you got to see and play like if you ain’t see, as you don’t know who are the accomplices. They may want to harm you. You got children?” she asked, and after I replied in the affirmative, she responded, “Pray for them.”
This daring and audacious robbery has been etched in my memory, and whenever I return to the courthouses and look into the eyes of convicted robbers, I will remember how ruthless they can be.