Chaguanas mayor renews call for joint patrols

Chaguanas Mayor Gopaul Boodhan expressed sadness with the triple murder that took place in Cunupia on Saturday.

He said over the last years, and most importantly this year, he has worked with all stakeholders in the security business, including national security, to make sure Chaguanas is safe and secure.

“We have faced challenges, some of which are outside of our control, and outside my control as mayor. But we continue to work with the police and that murder is very sad.

As a matter of fact, one murder in the Borough of Chaguanas is one too many,” said Boodhan.

He said that since Chaguanas has continued to develop and grow, it has unfortunately attracted criminal elements.

“Information I’ve received from the business community, organisations and other persons has indicated to me that there is a migration of elements from other parts of the country that come into Chaguanas to destabilise and create problems as it relates to criminal activities and, in this case, murder as what took place in the Cunupia area.”

He said he has made several calls this year and will continue to make the calls for the joint army and police patrols, not only around Christmas and Carnival, but throughout the entire year, and all over the Borough of Chaguanas.

“This has always been my call to bring crime and criminal elements under control,” said Boodhan.

Meanwhile Hamilton Glasgow, brother of Wellington Thomas, who was one of the three shot to death last Saturday morning in Cunupia, said yesterday his family were still in shock with the killing. He said: “So far we keeping up okay but it is still shocking to us.”

He told Newsday, since most of the family reside abroad, they are now in the process of making arrangements to return home for the funeral. Those family members include the sisters and mother of the deceased. However funeral arrangements cannot be made until the autopsy is done, which is scheduled to take place on Wednesday.

At the time of Thomas’s killing, his common law wife Binta James was also shot and killed, as was Kiston Guy.

The couple’s baby was also grazed by a bullet, and Guy’s girlfriend remains warded at the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex in Mount Hope having been shot in the leg by the gunmen who carried out the attack.