A 20-year-old remand prisoner on Wednesday night became the fourth person to be stabbed by fellow inmates in the Camp Street Prison in recent times and his relatives are not satisfied that he received adequate medical attention.
Adrian Bishop of 188 Campbellville Housing Scheme and a robbery-under- arms accused was taken to the Georgetown Hospital around 11:30 on Wednesday night with a single stab wound to the abdomen.
Stabroek News was reliably informed that he sustained the wound during a fight with other inmates over a cellular phone.
It is unclear what was used to stab him. After being evaluated and given some treatment he was returned to the prison around lunch yesterday.
Director of Prisons Dale Erskine yesterday declined to comment on the issue and referred all questions to the Home Affairs Ministry.
Several attempts to contact Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee were also futile and no statement from the ministry was forthcoming up to press time last night.
When Stabroek News spoke with the prisoner’s mother Adene Bishop the woman was very upset over the way her son’s wounding was handled.
According to her no one contacted her and had it not been for someone at the hospital she knew, she would not have known he was injured.
“Is not that alone I vex about, they should keep he for at least 24 hours to mek sure he all right. Is bore me son get bore an that does got to get treat internally. Me son bleeding internally ya know”, Adene told this newspaper.
She explained that her son has a hole in his heart and would sometimes bleed through his mouth and as such his current situation should have been treated carefully and with a lot of attention.
Adene said that while at the medical institution, her son received two bottles of saline along with a liquid in a smaller bottle.
During the 6 am visiting hours, though he had received the liquids he was still visibly weak and was limping, she said adding that he also underwent two x rays and some blood tests.
“If he go back in there and dead now, what they gon do? I know he bad yeah but they shoulda keep he at least for 24 hours man”, she said. Recounting what she had heard about the incident, the woman said that sometime on Wednesday night, her son was in a cell with others when he was attacked. According to her it was over a cell phone but she did not know if her son was in possession of the instrument.
The woman informed this newspaper that Bishop is currently before the court on a robbery under arms matter. According to her, he was granted $150, 000 bail in the High Court in April and she had accumulated the bulk of the money and is currently working hard to get the rest.
Adene said that her son has been in jail for almost a month for this matter and he also had two other robbery under arms charges.
However she expressed disappointment that the matters are still ongoing despite the fact that none of the virtual complainants would turn up.
In August last year Bishop and Devon Ford were charged with robbing a man of his motorcycle and other articles together valued $170,000.
In the past two weeks there have been three other stabbings in the prison.
On August 19, Dwayne Archibald and Davendra `Nave’ Beharry died after sustaining stab wounds.
Archibald, one of the six inmates who attempted to escape from the Georgetown Prisons last December, was stabbed in June by another prisoner while Beharry was stabbed by other inmates one day after he was placed on remand for a larceny charge.
The police have since launched investigations into both incidents.
Then on August 15, 37-year-old Mark Campbell, was taken to the Georgetown Hospital, after being stabbed in the chest during a fight with another prisoner.