Material things can be acquired again but his son is gone forever are the sentiments of Cecil Semple whose house was robbed when he left for the hospital after learning of his son’s fatal accident on Friday.
Cecil Semple lost his second child, Guyana Defence Force captain Ancel Semple in what appeared to be a hit and run accident shortly before 10 pm on Friday. The man had just ridden off from home on his CBR motorcycle when tragedy struck. No one seems to know the exact circumstances of the accident, but two motor cars said to be implicated are impounded at the Brickdam Police Station as investigations continue.
Cecil Semple said that the most likely explanation so far is that the two cars may have been travelling in opposite directions on Aubrey Barker Road; one must have clipped the soldier causing him to lose control of the bike, crashing headlong into the other.
The elder Semple who is an ex-police Assistant Superintendent told Stabroek News yesterday that his son had called earlier in the afternoon to tell him he would visit and could have well been on his way to his father’s house when he died.
Upon hearing the news of the accident via a phone call, the father made his way to the hospital, leaving his home unprotected and open to an unscrupulous thief, only awaiting an opportunity to pounce. When Cecil Semple returned home he found that his computer’s CPU, 2 digital cameras, a brand new chain saw and a 50-piece power drill that was never used were all gone.
He told Stabroek News that he had only spent 45 minutes at the hospital and returned home to make phone calls to relatives and friends. It was when he was attempting to view the contents on a disc to give this newspaper a photo of the dead man he realized that the CPU was missing. The other items were discovered missing later in the night. The thief did not take the 17-inch monitor since he may not have had the time, the man opined.
Cecil Semple, who took up professional photography after his career in the police force, said that his studio was robbed prior to Friday night. He says he believes he knows who is responsible for the acts but is not getting a proper response from the police.
Meanwhile when questioned on the circumstances of his son’s death and whether he believed it was an accident given that it occurred some three houses from where he lived and Semple could not be going at top speed when the accident occurred, Cecil Semple said that he wishes to refrain from thinking that way unless police investigations prove otherwise.
“What I do know is that my son was a reasonably rounded soldier and was moving up the ranks very fast,” he stated. “He was a captain at age 31 and would have been up for major soon,” he added.
The man said that he did not know of his son having any enemies, and even though anything is possible he wants to “distance myself from that kind of thinking.”
Ancel Semple entered the army in 1998 and was sent to Sandhurst (British Army Officer training centre) where he spent one year. Upon returning to Guyana he was stationed at Camp Ayanganna. He was involved in the training aspect of army operations, his father related to Stabroek News. He was later transferred to Camp Stephenson at Timehri where he was still stationed at the time of his death. Cecil Semple explained however that his son would be around the country on training programmes which is what he was doing at Tacama in the last two weeks; he had returned to Georgetown earlier on the day of his accident.
Ancel was involved in a pre-mash accident on the Linden Highway several years ago where four persons had died.
A post-mortem examination is expected on Wednesday.
