Roving cops intercept armed bandits at crime scene
–recover gun and some of the loot

BUSINESSMAN Kalicharand Surupaul and his wife complied with the requests of three heavily armed gunmen who invaded their home at Lot 205 Prospect, East Bank Demerara early Monday morning, and were able to have their lives and those of their three children spared.Speaking with this newspaper yesterday, the businessman related that he had returned from a wedding reception and had locked up his home and had gone to bed, but was alerted to a noise at approximately 03:00 hrs.

When he ventured into the lower flat of his two-storeyed home, he was confronted by three masked and heavily armed gunmen, who tied him up with duct tape and beat him in the head with a hammer while demanding cash and jewellery, and enquiring whether he was the holder of a firearm, to which he responded in the negative.

Surupaul, who was not hesitant in speaking with this newspaper, explained that the men choked him and continued to beat him to the point where he began having difficulty breathing. By that time, his wife had also ventured downstairs, and the gunmen tossed her on the floor and made the same request of her that they made of him — for cash, jewellery and firearm(s).

The businessman said the men had gained entry to his home by removing a sheet of glass from a window next to the front door, then screwing out the grill work. When this newspaper interviewed the businessman, it was observed that his eyes were bloodshot and his head was lacerated.

In evaluating the items that the bandits had removed from his house, the businessman recalled that the men had made off with $800,000 in cash, 780,000 in cheques, and $2 million worth of jewellery. They also removed three laptops from the home.

After the men had finished robbing the house and were exiting the yard, police who were patrolling the area at the time observed them and initially mistook them for members of a private security service who were doing routine checks, since the place was dark and it was not immediately clear to the ranks that the three were masked; but after realising that the men were masked, the police immediately became suspicious and opened fire on the men, who returned fire. Two of the bandits were able to flee, but the third was arrested right at the location, and the police were also able to recover a firearm and the three laptops which that bandit had on his person, coupled with one of two phones which were stolen.

Kalicharand Surupaul told the Guyana Chronicle that this is the first time his family had had such a traumatic experience, and they were all shaken by it. He said that all the loss the family had suffered in the past had amounted to a few little things going missing from around the yard through the action of petty bandits.

When this publication visited the Surupauls yesterday morning, the police were again on the scene, and the ranks from the Criminal Investigation Department were dusting the place for finger prints even as the lower flat of the house’s interior was evidently ransacked.
Persons from the area who heard of the incident converged at the scene at dawn, and were offering comforting words to the shaken family members. The police investigations into the matter are continuing.

(By Leroy Smith)