No word on DNA results, cell phone probe

The DNA results of the miners who were slaughtered at their Lindo Creek Upper Berbice river camp are yet to be made public, even as relatives remain at a loss as to where investigators are heading.

Camp owner Leonard Arokium told Stabroek News that he had not heard anything about the tests. However, he said, he is still being made to answer many questions from relatives and friends of the deceased who are concerned that months after the tests were taken they have still not received any word of their results.

The last official word on the results was that the police were awaiting those reports to complete their investigations after which the file would be forwarded to the Office of the Director of Pubic Prosecutions for advice. The police have refused to release any other information regarding the status of their investigation into the still mysterious killings, which they have said bore the trademark of now dead fugitive Rondell ‘Fineman’ Rawlins and his notorious gang.

Meanwhile, no word has come from the police on investigations into revelations that the phone which Dax Arokium, one of the slain miners, reportedly had in his possession at the time of his death had been activated days after the slaughter. Several calls were made from the number, telephone records have shown. Police had said that they had requested records from the phone company, but had never said anything on whether they were investigating any of the persons to whom calls were made.

Arokium told this newspaper on Monday that he had not heard anything from the lawmen but was interested in finding out the state of those investigations.

Moments before he left Kwakwani to go into Lindo Creek on the morning of June 5, 2008 Dax Arokium had called a friend asking for credit to be put on his cell phone account so that he could make contact with the driver of the tractor who was taking him into the backdam.

This would mean that Dax Arokium had the phone with him around the time he was killed and the use of it in the days after eight burnt bodies were discovered at the camp, would point tellingly at suspects.

The man’s friend, who this newspaper made contact with, said Dax had called him just after 2 am and told him he was waiting for the tractor but needed $200 in credit and could not find a place to purchase a phone card. The man said he was at his friend’s house when he received the call, but was able to purchase the card, put the credit into his phone and then make the transfer to Dax’s phone. He said the transaction was completed around 2.30 pm and he received a message from the service provider that it had been successful. He said that was the last he heard from Dax. He said he knew that Dax usually left Kwakwani very early in the mornings to go into the backdam.

A female friend of Dax had alerted his family to the fact that the phone he had with him when he died at Lindo creek was in use when she received a message on July 4, four weeks after the burnt remains of were found at Lindo Creek by his father, Leonard Arokium.

It is believed that the text the young woman received was sent by Dax but he lost signal before it was transmitted.

When the phone was activated in a signal area again, after the slaughter, the text, which would have been pending was automatically transmitted to the young woman’s phone.

The woman had told this newspaper that she was in downtown Georgetown when she received the message and initially she did not know who it was from as Dax had two phones, one of which was very new and she was not familiar with the number. She said she immediately dialled the number but while someone pressed the answer button no one answered and she only heard noise in the background before the phone went off. She said she redialled the number but it appeared that the phone had been turned off.

The young woman said it was about a week or two later as she was going through her phone records that she came across the text again and suspected that it may have come from Dax’s phone. She said she immediately called the young man’s brother, who confirmed that the number was for a phone Dax had had in his possession