A 25-year-old Guyanese, who migrated for an employment opportunity, was fatally shot on Thursday while walking along a roadway in Beetham Gardens, Trinidad.
A Trinidad Express report yesterday said that Samuel De Souza became Trinidad’s “430th murder victim [Thursday] morning, after he was shot dead while walking along the roadway at Phase Four Beetham Gardens”.
Trinidad police, according to the article, said that at around 7.10 am that day De Souza, a carpenter, “was shot once in the back of the head by a lone gunman as he was walking near his home. The bullet exited through his face. Investigators said they believed De Souza was on his way to work, as a bag containing carpentry tools was found next to his body.”
De Souza, Trinidad police also said, was not known to have had any run-ins with the law. Investigators have also said no motive had been established for De Souza’s killing up to Thursday evening.
However, the Trinidad Express article stated one Beetham Gardens resident said De Souza may have been linked to a double murder in Diego Martin, Trinidad on Wednesday, in which two men, Wendell Rogers and Joel Medina were shot dead as they were driving along Jean Avenue.
When contacted yesterday a woman, who told Stabroek News De Souza was a distant cousin, said that she’d discovered yesterday that the man had been murdered but had not been informed of any details surrounding the man’s death. She further said that she was the man’s closest relative in Guyana and the others lived abroad.
“I only just learnt of his [De Souza’s] death and I can’t tell you anything about it because I was not informed of details,” the woman, who requested her name not by published, said. “I am his closest relative here…he has an aunt but she left the country and there is no one else.”
Meanwhile, a senior police source said the Guyana Police Force had not been informed of De Souza’s death by their counterparts in Trinidad.