By STACY MOORE Saturday, June 14 2008

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SAW MOM CHOPPED: One-year-old Joshua Paris...

A ONE-YEAR-OLD boy yesterday witnessed the chopping of his 25-year-old mother at their Gasparillo home.

The baby, Joshua Paris, was inside the house while his mother Christine Paris was being chopped by a 27-year-old male relative. Joshua was however unharmed.

Up to late yesterday, Paris remained warded at San Fernando General Hospital under police guard while officers continued the search for her attacker.

Police said Paris was chopped about her chest and feet but managed to escape from the man and ran to a nearby house begging for help.

But when medics arrived to take Paris to hospital at about 6 am, they were threatened and chased off by the male relative who was still armed with the cutlass.

When the medics returned with a police escort, the man lost his nerve and fled the scene.

It was also reported by residents in the area, in the haste to rush the injured woman to the hospital, both ambulance workers and police officers failed to remove the child who was still in the house.

The police however, quickly returned to the house and took Joshua. Up to late yesterday, the baby remained in the care of relatives at an undisclosed location.

“Enough is enough. That man went too far to chop a woman in front of an innocent baby,” a family friend stated.

“If that baby could have only talked, he would have been able to say what happened. He cried for a good while before finally calming down,” the woman stated.

At Paris’ home neighbours said that when the woman ran out of the house, she was covered in blood.

“I did not know then what happened but I helped her telephone for an ambulance which arrived immediately. But she could not get into the ambulance as the man kept swinging his cutlass at her.

He then pointed it at the emergency medical technicians and told them ‘go’,” a resident said.

Cpl Sookoo of the Gasparillo Police Station is continuing investigations.