COURTNEY Wong, the brother of one of the miners killed at Lindo Creek, told the commission that he heard two soldiers conversing about a fire they had reportedly seen in the area days prior to the discovery of the charred remains.

Wong, the brother of the late Clifton Wong, reappeared before the Commission of Inquiry (CoI) led by Justice (Ret’d) Donald Trotman on Thursday, after his testimony came to an abrupt end last week after one of his nieces fainted during the hearing. He had accompanied ranks of the Guyana Police Force (GPF) and Guyana Defence Force along with the state’s Pathologist Dr Nehaul Singh and team to Lindo Creek on June 22, 2008.
“In the process of tying up the remains…there were two ranks, soldiers in uniform they conversing [and they said]… this had to be the fire we saw when they were doing surveillance,” Wong recalled. However, the soldiers reportedly denied ever discussing that they had seen a fire in the vicinity of the crime scene during their surveillance exercise. After assisting the Joint Services in locating the camp site where the miners were killed, Wong said he was taken aback by a Kaieteur News article which had suggested that he and Leonard Arokium had colluded “to stray” the ranks that were en-route to the camp.
“I saw a headline…stating that Mr Leonard Arokium sent a guy to take the police and the soldiers and the pathologist to stray them and take them to the wrong camp,” he called.
According to Wong, he contacted a senior rank of the GPF to express his concern, and was told “you know how the media does put these things over, come into my office.” He, however, did not visit the office of the senior officer.

Meanwhile, Rhonda Fileen Hutson, the niece of Compton Speirs, was among other witnesses who testified on Thursday. She told the commission that her uncle, who was a loving and selfless person, did not deserve to die the way he did.
“He was a lovely uncle…He was someone who looked out for you…he did not deserve a death like [that],” Hutson told the commission.
Clearly emotional and shaken, the woman questioned who could commit such gruesome murders.

“I question myself and ask, how? I can imagine when we get burnt how we feel. It’s like when you’re sleeping, and someone throws water on you, how you react when your eyes are open. I don’t know if they were sleeping or whatever, but imagine you are sleeping and someone shoots all around you.”

Though it’s almost 10 years since her uncle was killed along with seven other miners, she said it remains fresh in the hearts of his family. Hutson said the pain is even greater, knowing that they were not given the opportunity to bid final goodbye to their uncle, contending that if the family had been given even a small “bone” of her uncle’s remains, they would have been satisfied.