…Crime Chief promises to look into matter

BUSINESSMAN Freeman Fordyce was locked up over the weekend after he got into an altercation with a police inspector who led a party of police ranks to his business to execute a search warrant of two of his establishments on George Street, Georgetown.

The businessman was locked up after he resisted arrest, reportedly assaulted a peace officer and on suspicion of trafficking in persons. But in a video that was shown to this newspaper, which was caught on CCTV footage, the police inspector who was also accused of planting a weapon on the businessman some time ago during a similar operation at the business establishment, was attempting to effect a “pat down” on the businessman when he resisted.

The businessman said he resisted on the grounds that the rank could not be trusted; and that there was the likelihood that he would plant something again on him. The previous matter of the allegation about planting a weapon is engaging the attention of the force.

Its in his attempt to resist the arrest that the police inspector whipped out a pistol and attempted to shoot the businessman but the weapon snapped and failed to fire. At that point other ranks who were on the operation attempted to bring some level of calm between the two and returned the situation to normalcy but in the video, the inspector kept advancing to take control of the operation in which he was the most senior rank.

The Guyana Chronicle was told the inspector was forced to take out his weapon and attempted to shoot, as he felt that the businessman could be in possession of an illegal weapon and that he might have brought harm to the other members of the operation. Additionally, it was reported that the inspector was the only person on the scene who had a weapon at the time, since the back-up patrol had not yet arrived to lend support to the team from headquarters.

The businessman operates the Diamond Hotel and Bar at George Street which provides adult entertainment to patrons. We were advised that the operation on Friday was to check on the documentation for females who have been working at the establishment. Reports are that the women were removed from the facility and their documents were found to be intact, but persons close to the operation of the night club indicated that the women were threatened not to return to the establishment or they would be locked up.

Contacted on Monday, Crime Chief Lyndon Alves indicated that he was made aware about some sort of development at the business place during the operation when he was given the preliminary report of what this newspaper saw on the cameras. He said that he too saw some of it and would be requesting that his detectives go to the area to retrieve the full recording.

The crime chief explained that the force is not in the habit of keeping police ranks away from an operation where it is perceived that the public might have a confidence issue with a [particular rank who is assigned to the operation. He said that however, that based on the circumstances of things which took place on Friday last, there will be some review, as it relates to some operation even as he promised that a probe would be launched into the incident.