Father of kidnapped teen may send children abroad

YESTERDAY marked 16 days since Port of Spain teenager Darrell Cuffy was kidnapped, and his worried father is now contemplating sending his three other children abroad to prevent what happened to his eldest son.

Businessman Farrell Cuffy yesterday made a heart-rending plea to the kidnappers who snatched his son, to send him home in time for Mother’s Day on Sunday so that his wife Elizabeth could smile once more.

“If those people have a mother or a sister or even a daughter, they should consider how his mother is feeling at this time, because to take a child away from their mother is one of the most vicious acts someone could perpetrate against that mother and child, and I am begging, literally begging those people to please send my son home.”

Yesterday, police investigators said they have not given up hope that Darrell is alive and said they are working round the clock to find him.

On April 25, around 9.31 pm Darrell was driving his father’s BMW along Collens Road, Maraval, when two men in a dark-coloured SUV blocked the car and snatched the screaming Darrell and bundled him into the SUV. The kidnappers left behind Darrell’s two cell phones.

Anti-kidnapping officers led by acting Snr Supt Ajith Persad, head of the Port of Spain CID, are leading the investigation.

Farrell said since Darrell was snatched, his wife has been sleeping in her son’s bed, smelling his clothes and asking the Almighty to have her child returned to her.

“We do not speak to each other, we just live in the same house. My daughters have not returned to school and my other son is growing more and more frustrated at not knowing where his brother is.” He said Darrell is extremely close to his mother because he is her first-born, and now that he has been taken away from her, all her joy has turned to sorrow because she is wondering if her son is alive or dead, and if he is alive, if he is being fed, or under what conditions he is being kept.