Families wait for justice, year after 3 die in police shooting

July 2, 2022, for most was just another busy Saturday, but for three families, that day was a nightmare the wish they could wake from.

While on their way to Beetham Gardens, three people, two teens and an adult were killed by police in an alleged shootout.

Police reported that they were in keeping with their use-of-force policy when they returned fire on a white Toyota Aqua, killing Leonardo Williams, Fabien Richards, and Isaiah Roberts.

After the supposed shootout that forced the driver to crash into Republic Bank, Independence Square, three were dead, two injured, one shot, and a nation left wanting answers.

The autopsy for the two 17-year-olds Williams and Roberts and 21-year-old Richards said all three were shot from behind, multiple times.

At 6 pm on Sunday, the relatives of the three will return to the death scene for a candlelight vigil and to highlight the 12 months without justice.

In May, the Police Complaints Authority (PCA) told the family's attorney Om Lalla that it recommended an inquest into the deaths, naming three officers who should be the subjects.

That month, Sunday Newsday spoke with a survivor of the shooting as well as relatives of the three who were killed.

The witness, a young man in his early twenties, sat on the porch of his Beetham home, bareback and his hair opened out.

In the centre of his back was a scar, he said that was from a bullet grazing him as he slouched in the car with three others.

A year later, after the report that the carload of people opened fire on police, none of the survivors were charged with any offence, including possession of an illegal weapon.

The witness recounted what happened leading up to the killings, saying it began when the driver of the car refused to stop when ordered to by police in Diego Martin.

Taking deep, slow breaths as he spoke, the 23-year-old said the police approached them along the Diego Martin Highway and after the driver failed to stop, there was a car chase.

He said the five others in the car begged the driver to stop, but he didn't.

“When the car almost reached the bank, I don’t know if it was the car behind us, but a police jeep hit the car and we crash into the wall by the bank. I end up butting my head on the front seat. I look around to see if everybody okay and I see everybody putting their hand out the window, so I started to do the same thing. That was when shots started to fire.”

He said while slouched in the back seat, he heard the gunshots and felt the car shaking. When he thought the shooting was never-ending, he shouted, “We just trying to go home!”

It was then that the gunshots stopped.

At their Beetham Gardens home in May, Leo Williams and Lucky Joseph, parents to Williams said then that his killing forced them to become reliant on puncheon rum and cigarettes to cope.

Leo said he has had severe panic attacks and would leave his home at all hours and find himself at the Tunapuna Public Cemetery to speak to his son.

“You know, is one thing to kill him, but to tarnish he name and say he shoot at you? I have to clear my son's name," he said then.

Roberts' grandmother Michelle John said she no longer enjoyed Saturdays since the killing.

Like Richards' mother Nicole, they are relying on God for answers.

On July 14, then acting police commissioner Mc Donald Jacob assured that the investigation was nearing its end. The relatives of the three said the last information they got from the investigator was that one vital piece of evidence was outstanding.