Latest update April 20th, 2024 12:59 AM
Apr 04, 2016 News
There seems to be some confusion over who paid to have Army Lance Corporal, Kevon Payne executed last Tuesday.
While investigators are convinced that they have the shooter in custody, they have a lot more work to do in order to figure out who really wanted Payne dead.
They are hoping to solve this puzzle by today, once the result of tests conducted on the hands of at least two suspects for traces of gunpowder residue, become available.
Ranks are convinced that once they are equipped with the results, persons will start talking.
Payne’s death occurred two days before another Charlestown resident, Gladstone Taylor was also executed, a short distance from where the soldier was gunned down.
Investigators believe that the two killings are related.
There are four persons in custody for the two execution-style killings which occurred in a matter of three days in Charlestown.
Lance Corporal Kevon Payne was gunned down in front of his mother’s Charlestown home last Tuesday.
The alleged shooter and an Albouystown drug dealer, who is said to have ordered the hit, are in custody.
The second execution was that of Taylor, a father of five, who was shot dead last Friday.
Payne’s brother, Vellone Thorne and one of his friends are in custody for Taylor’s killing. There are eyewitnesses who claimed to have seen Thorne shooting the father of five at a liming spot in Charlestown.
POSSIBLE LINK
Detectives are working on a number of theories and are hoping to solve these two execution-style killings soon.
One theory is that Taylor had ordered the hit on the soldier.
According to information received, Vellone Thorne, who was described by villagers as a “trouble maker” would usually get into problem with a number of persons in both Albouystown and Charlestown and would then complain to his soldier brother, Payne.
Reports are that the soldier would then confront these persons and even threaten them.
“This soldier boy is na no easy person. His brother does pick trouble with everybody and then he (soldier) does come and bad up to people because he is a soldier so he feel he big and bad,” a resident said.
Investigators are hearing that Taylor, who is considered the ‘Godfather’ for the area, got tired of the brothers’ drama and paid to have the soldier killed.
It is believed that Vellone Thorne found out about the hit and decided to take matters into his own hands after his brother was killed.
But there is also a theory that the same Albouystown drug dealer who is in custody ordered the hit and not Taylor.
According to information received, a few days before his brother was killed, Vellone Thorne was involved in an argument with a drug dealer, who is known to the family.
The argument turned physical and the drug dealer reportedly later threatened to “finish” Thorne.
Kaieteur News was told that the drug dealer boasted that he has $10M and was willing to pay “the experts” to take out Thorne because he was too “disrespectful.”
There are reports that when Kevon Payne heard about the incident involving his sibling, he asked for time off from his work last Tuesday to go home and sort things out.
“Payne come like big boy to confront the man (drug dealer) and he even jump over the man fence. He tell the man that if he touch his brother, he gone gat to live in the sky,” the resident said.
Later that same day, the soldier was executed in front of his home.
Investigators now have to figure out if anyone was paid to have the soldier killed and how Taylor’s killing is linked to Payne’s death.
Meanwhile, Thorne’s father, Rudolph Thorne, in an interview said that his son could not have killed Taylor, since he was at a wake at their home for his dead brother. This is despite the fact that three eyewitnesses have told police that they saw Vellone Thorne shoot Taylor.
“My son has no reason to kill Tuffy. The police already arrested the people who killed my stepson, so why Vellone would kill Tuffy?”
However, the older Thorne did admit that they had initially blamed a family member of Taylor’s for his stepson’s death.
According to Rudolph Thorne, when O’Riley Small was gunned down on March 19, last, a nephew of Taylor was telling villagers that it was Vellone Thorne who had killed the former robbery accused.
Words got back to Vellone Thorne and he allegedly confronted Taylor’s nephew.
“My son confronted the nephew and later that day he (the nephew) came to me and tell me that Vellone said that he was telling people that Vellone killed O’Riley. I told him not to worry with that because people already get charged,” Thorne said.
He added that later that day, his stepson, Payne, was executed.
“The same day my son and this boy had a confrontation, my stepson was killed, so we thought that it was him but then we later learnt that it was the drug dealer who organized the hit,” the older Thorne said.
Two of Taylor’s sons, Keron and Clive, were charged for the September 4, 2015 murder of East Ruimveldt resident, Senesie Lewis, 22, of Pineapple Street, East Ruimveldt. Lewis was gunned down in front of the popular Ghetto Flex nightspot, located at James and Albouys Streets, Albouystown. They are presently awaiting trial.
Where is the BETTER MANAGEMENT/RENEGOTIATION OF THE OIL CONTRACTS you promised Jagdeo?
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