After 80 days, teen’s mom gets text from kidnapper

SHIP MONEY: Darrell Cuffy...missing 80 days
SHIP MONEY: Darrell Cuffy...missing 80 days

EIGHTY days after her teenage son Darrell Cuffy was kidnapped and no ransom demanded for his release, Elizabeth Payne the victim’s mother received a text message from the alleged kidnapper.

Payne wasted no time in informing the police investigating her son’s disappearance and she is hoping that all the resources are used to trace the text message so that her son could be found.

Yesterday Farrell Cuffy the father of Darrell told Newsday the message from the alleged kidnapper stated that they are waiting for him to sell one of his boats so that he could get the ransom money to pay for his son’s release.

Cuffy said as far as he is aware the text could be traced because the number is registered from the texter and he believes the police can use technology to trace the identity.

He said that while he is relieved that there may be a chance his son is still alive, he is hoping that the perpetrators are found and brought to justice.

Cuffy who is the owner of two cargo ships placed ads in Guyana and St Vincent for the sale of his ships one month after his son was kidnapped. If the ships are sold they will fetch a large sum of money for Cuffy who shied away yesterday from giving an actual value of his two vessels.

He said he used the ships to distribute bottled water, industrial products and Rotoplastics products throughout the Caribbean.

However he added that initially while he resisted paying a ransom for his son’s release he has now reconsidered and is willing to pay if his son is released. “I am in fact selling out the business including the two cargo ships because I am coming out of the business, as recently someone tried to put drugs on the vessel, I do not want to get tied up in that, I do not want any further problems in my family. If they release my son I will consider paying a ransom if the vessel sells. I have placed ads in Guyana and St Vincent that I am selling the vessel, there has been no response so far. One month after my son was kidnapped I put the vessel up for sale”.

Cuffy maintained that the police probing his son’s kidnapping are being hindered in their jobs as they do not have the proper tools and he is calling on the government to invest in those resources such as state of the art technology to assist in the fight against crimes such as kidnapping. He however added he feels trapped like a wounded animal and believes that the public has moved away from being their brother’s keeper. “I am feeling empty, because it feels my life has no purpose again, at the end of the day I am not free in Trinidad, I feeling like I am kidnapped too, if my son missing 80 days and I do not know anything, how will I be able to move freely? Nobody in my family has a life anymore.”

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