POLICE in Berbice have arrested three suspects for Sunday’s robbery of a Tucber Park, New Amsterdam businessman as Berbicians praise the lawmen’s efforts in solving some of the recent crimes in the region.

The suspected bandits were arrested at a New Amsterdam Hotel as investigations into the robbery where one of the suspects was apprehended and injured by the householder continue.

According to Deputy Commander of B Division, Senior Superintendent Errol Watts, based on information they went to the Church View International Hotel where three men and three females all associated were found. Watts noted that two of the men fit the description of the two who were in the businessman’s home on Sunday.

Following the capture of suspect Brian Dhanphat at the home of supermarket owner Nicholas Harrinandan on Sunday morning, police were provided with the names of the two who had escaped following the failed robbery attempt. Watts said the men are also wanted for a series of armed robberies including one involving A. Ally and Sons where a deposit bag contained G$3.7 million and US$2300 was taken from a clerk as she was about to enter a commercial bank to make a deposit.

Businessman, Harrinandan had suffered chop wounds to the face and head and was later taken to the New Amsterdam Hospital and subsequently transferred to the Georgetown Public Hospital for further treatment.
The police in a release had said at about 01:20 hrs Sunday three men, one armed with a shotgun and another with cutlass broken into the home of Harrinandan who armed himself with a cutlass and attacked the bandits during which he was chopped about the body. He however managed to inflict injuries on one of the bandits. The other two perpetrators escaped, but in their haste to do so abandoned the shotgun which was recovered by the police, the release said.

Reports are that Harrinandan was on his verandah sleeping when the men climbed into the house by using the verandah. He later got into a scuffle with one of the bandits during which time he was injured. At the time the men entered the house the supermarket owner and his wife were at home alone.
Reports are that Dhanphat received injures to his legs, face and forearms.

Meanwhile, Dhanphat who was discharged from hospital and is currently in police custody told the media in the presence of the police that he was at Harrinandan’s home on Sunday morning because of a drug-related incident, but he provided no further details. Harrinandan back in April 6, 2014 was intercepted at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) with some 7.5 kilogrammes of cocaine concealed in cheese rolls, pine tarts, mittai and in the soles of a pair of shoes. According to Watts, two of the men arrested on Monday evening are also suspects in other matters including the New Amsterdam Market Stall robbery last Thursday. Before the three men were arrested at the hotel, police had discovered a motorbike parked at a gas station which is adjacent to the hotel and have since linked it to that which was used in the A. Ally robbery and also last Thursday’s robbery in the New Amsterdam Market.

Crime-solving
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo’s Region 6 envoy Gobin Harbhajan, has reported that residents in the East Berbice/Corentyne region are praising the coalition government’s intensified efforts to fight crime. Harbhajan said the residents lauded Vice-President and Minister of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan because in most of the cases, the criminals were apprehended within weeks. This, Harbhajan reported, was very different to what the residents were subjected to in the past when crimes went routinely unsolved.
In addition, he said that during his many interactions with residents, they explained that they are cognisant that the majority of the crimes in the region are of a petty nature.
Following efforts by certain sections of the media to describe the crime situation as “out of control,” Harbhajan said he decided to go on a fact-finding mission on the ground in Region 6. “I decided to visit with prominent persons from the region to validate whether the crime situation was spiralling out of control as we have been reading in one newspaper in particular,” Harbhajan said. “I made visits around Corentyne, Berbice, where I gathered information from respectable individuals in the community such as former President of the Upper Corentyne Chamber of Commerce David Subnauth; Vibert Welch, Chairman for the Cop and Faith Community and the Berbice/Corentyne District Chairman for the Community Policing Group Abdool Nasir.”
The Prime Minister’s representative reported that, “They all agreed that residents experienced petty crimes.” Further, they believe that with the expected picking-up of the economy, such crimes will definitely take a downward turn.