Woman shot in leg, children held at gunpoint

Oct 18, 2010 News

Bandits terrorise Kaneville family…

– suspects send threatening calls to victims
Three armed bandits stormed a Kaneville East Bank Demerara home, shortly after midnight yesterday, shooting a female in the leg and gun butting her fiancé before escaping with over $475,000.
Twenty one year old Linda King was shot in the leg while her fiancé Akeem Ames, 18, was gun-butted, while a bullet grazed his back.
Up to press time one person was in custody while another managed to elude the police.
The detained man is said to be a resident of Kaneville.
Kaieteur News understands that the suspect has a brother who was recently charged with murder.
The other suspect who managed to elude the police goes by the alias of “Piggy”. This newspaper was told that the suspect heard the police were looking for him and quickly left his home.

Shot victim Linda King and her boyfriend

The victims alleged that they have since received several threatening phone calls from persons demanding that the suspect be released.
The injured woman, Linda King, yesterday related to Kaieteur News that she was awoken by a loud crashing sound sometime after midnight.
The woman said she jumped out of her bed and was greeted by a gun in her face. “As soon as I jump up I see de gun in meh face” King said.
According to the young woman, the bandits immediately demanded for to tell them where her mother in law was hiding her money.
King’s mother-in-law, Michelle Menezes, is employed as a cook in the interior and also operates a dredge.
She had just come out from the location.
Ms. King said that she told the bandits that she did not know if the woman had come out with any money.
King said the robbers then grabbed two of the youngest children in the home and placed guns to their heads.
“After I tell them I aint know where de money deh….they pick up the children and put de gun to them head”, King said.
King said that bandits then switched their attention to her and started beating her with the gun. The woman said after she began questioning the men, they became annoyed and just shot her to the leg.
Akeem Ames told Kaieteur News that the bandits took him and his girlfriend to his aunt’s home, located a few yards from where the attack occurred.
The aunt, Yonette Walters said that the bandits kicked open her door and asked her “where the chicken money deh?”
However, they left empty-handed after tearing her nightgown and threatening her seven-year-old daughter.
The owner of the home, Michelle Menezes, yesterday told this publication that she has become traumatised after the robbery.
The woman said that she only came out of the interior to start repairing her home, and the money was for this purpose.
She said that the money was hidden in a haversack with books, but the bandits searched until they found the bag.
“They search until they find the money…I never expected them to check their”, cried the woman.
The woman’s 76 year old mother who was also in the house was also terrorised by the gun toting bandits.
Ms. Menezes told Kaieteur News she was awakened at around 01:00 hrs by a banging on a zinc that the family uses to block a hole in their front door.
“Next thing I know, the door kick open, and I see a man with a red jersey and gold teeth. The person cocked his handgun and say ‘somebody gun dead in hay’. Then the man put on a black stocking.”

The house that the gunmen invaded

Menezes said that before the bandits could attack, she smashed one of the walls of her shack and flee.
“I hear ‘where the woman who does go in the bush, where the money?’ I hear a shot, and I turn and face the house and I hear a second shot and I say ‘oh God somebody fuh me dead.”
Ms. Menezes said she fled to a neighbour’s house, which was unoccupied at the time. She then went to another resident’s home, and asked the occupants to call the police.
The injured persons were taken to the Diamond Diagnostic Center where they were treated and sent away.
Meanwhile, a number of neighbours yesterday complained about the petty thieves who have been wreaking havoc in the community.
One resident said that there is a particular street that persons are afraid of going to at nights.
“They got a street name ‘Wrong Turn’…..nobody don’t want to go in there at nights…its that bad,” said the resident.
The resident said that most of the crimes are being committed by young boys who drop out of school.
The resident opined that more extracurricular activities should be introduced into the community which would occupy the youths’ time.
“Give them an opportunity and maybe the crime would stop,” said that resident.