Lone survivor of Rio Claro shootings still in hospital

Eddy Lallan, the lone survivor of the horrific shooting that claimed the lives of his 13-year-old daughter and his brother at the family’s home at Libertville in Rio Claro, is still hospitalised.

On Wednesday, Eastern Division police confirmed that Lallan was still recuperating.

Andrea Lallan, a standard five student at the St Therese RC School, and her wheelchair-bound uncle Sylvan “Puncin” Lallan, 49, died around 2 am on September 29. About two years ago, Sylvan damaged his spine from a fall and since then had been unable to walk.

The deadly shooting happened while the three were asleep in their wooden house at Old Mayaro Road, Libertville.

Lallan got out of the house after being hit. A villager saw him with a wound to his neck and took him to the Rio Claro health facility. He was treated and later transferred to hospital.

The police were called, and they found Andrea’s body on a bed, while her uncle’s body was found on cushions on the living room floor.

Eastern Division and Homicide Bureau of Investigations (Region II) police gathered evidence, including eight spent shells of 9mm ammunition.

Residents, who requested anonymity, told Newsday the child had confided in her peers “over the years” about abuse by “different people.”

No one has been held in connection with the murders, and investigations are ongoing.

Autopsies were expected to be done during the week at the Forensic Science Centre in St James. The police could not confirm whether they were done on Wednesday.

The double murder happened hours before two people appeared before a Rio Claro magistrate charged with assault offences against Andrea.

The accused, a 23-year-old woman and a 49-year-old man, had been pointed out the day before in police identification parades.

Magistrate Ava Vandenberg-Bailey granted the woman $500,000 surety bail. But she denied bail to the man and remanded him into police custody.

They are expected to reappear in court on October 27. Sgt Arjoon was the court prosecutor.