A FAMILY “lime” at Herstelling, East Bank Demerara,(EBD) turned deadly when five armed bandits invaded the Lot 320, Third Street property and shot 43-year-old Abdool Ameer Subrati in the neck, after he tried to fight with the gunmen on Thursday morning.Subrati, of Peter’s Hall, EBD was rushed to the East Bank Demerara Regional Hospital and was subsequently transferred to the Georgetown Hospital, where he died hours after undergoing surgery to remove the bullet.

This newspaper understands that the bullet ricocheted to his spine and punctured his lung in the process. According to reports, three overseas-based Guyanese returned to Guyana Tuesday last and met with other relatives Wednesday night at the Herstelling house to plan a family reunion
The planning went into the wee hours of Thursday morning and when most of the relatives had left, the armed men emerged from a bathroom in the yard and pounced on Amika Appiah, who is visiting from the United States.
The men then rushed into the house, grabbed a bag containing three passports, green cards, cash, jewellery and cellphones. During the ordeal, a scuffle ensued between the bandits and Subrati, who was then shot in the neck. The gunmen fled the scene on foot.
In an interview with this publication, Appiah recalled what happened.
“We were going to call it a night at 1:45AM and some people started going home. We were then planning to go in Diamond Housing Scheme and Ameer who was shot was supposed to drive us there,” she said.
The traumatised woman said, “When I came downstairs one of the bandits came out of the toilet, then I screamed and the other four came out of the bathroom that is in the yard. They were all dressed in black and had white gloves, they had topes on their heads and kerchiefs across their faces, my husband was upstairs at the time getting ready to come down,” she explained.
Noting that her husband then rushed downstairs after hearing her scream, the distraught woman said two of the bandits who had handguns were told by the others to shoot her husband.
“He then ran back upstairs, his cousins and his brother who were outside then run into the yard after noticing what was going on, then they had a fight and one of them shoot Ameer. Two shots were fired. They then stick the others up and told them put the bottles they had in their hands down,” she said.
Appiah further said that the bandits then fled on foot and her brother-in-law was taken to the hospital.
“I never came to Guyana and was robbed before, now this happens.”
The police have since detained a 21-year-old man who is a tenant in the lower flat of the house. This newspaper was reliably informed that the same man is facing the court on a robbery charge.
One relative said that before the robbery occurred, the tenant and his wife who lived in the lower flat packed their belongings and moved out.
“After the robbery they came back to check and see what happened, when we come back from the hospital we see them here, this man does have all sort of thieves and drug smokers coming to him,” the relative said.