By Tiffny Rhodius
An accident along the Linden/Soesdyke Highway on Sunday night left a man dead and his family worrying where it will come up with the money to bury him.
Rudolph Joseph, 39, of Kuru Kuru, was struck down by a jeep PJJ 6498 at 7:15 pm Swan Turn Kuru Kuru Linden/Soesdyke Highway, according to police, who said the driver lost control of the vehicle.
The driver, Stabroek News has learnt, is in police custody assisting with the investigation. A police officer told this paper that charges will be brought against Singh.
Joseph’s sister, who was present when the accident occurred, told Stabroek News that she and some relatives were following him to the shop when they “hear the vehicle coming speed.” She said that her brother, who was in front of her, paused to look at his cell phone when the vehicle hit him.
She added that after he was hit, “the vehicle turn over and it keep turning over.” The young girl added that she and her relatives had to call out for Joseph and had to look for him with a torch light. They found him in the corner and “we shine the light and he mouth had blood.”
As the driver waited with Joseph, the girl said, she went to inform her family of what had happened. Joseph is believed to have died on the spot. A passing vehicle assisted the family with transporting his body to the Diamond Diagnostic Centre, where he was pronounced dead on arrival.
According to Joseph’s mother, Judy Joseph, her son was going to buy chicken for her at a shop in one mile Kuru Kuru.
The woman said that the driver’s lawyer and his daughter had visited them yesterday and the lawyer told them that his client was not to be blamed but rather BK International, which is currently undertaking road works in the area that Joseph was killed.
The lawyer, Vic Puran, told them that BK is to be blamed because it did not have any signals on the road.
However, when Stabroek News visited the family yesterday evening, there were signs warning of construction ahead as well as indicators with reflectors on the road. The family also said that at the time of the accident there were indicators and signals on the road.
Joseph’s family is questioning the conduct of the police in the matter. According to one of his relatives, the police had moved the vehicle the very night of the accident without making any markings on the road and then came back yesterday at around 11am in the morning to take measurements. When the family inquired why this was done, they were not given a response, the relative added.
‘All I need is help’
Meanwhile, Judy Joseph, who could not contain her grief, told Stabroek News that her son was a labourer and a farmer and a very poor man. She said that she had sought assistance from the driver’s son for the burial. “We are a very poor family and I asking for assistant to bury my son.
He get lil kids and they need they mother and I asking that if he [the driver] can come to that agreement to sponsor the funeral and compensate the family is my heart desire,” she said. “I don’t need a court story but I want him to stand the cost of the funeral,” she added, saying that she knew that her son is gone and cannot come back but she wants her grandchildren and their mother to be compensated and for her son to have a decent funeral.
Judy said the estimate for the funeral was given as $120,000 and she also needed to pay down a deposit of $5,000 at the funeral home where his body is being kept. She is holding on the hope that the driver would agree to compensate her family. “All I need is help,” she said.
Joseph was said to be a quiet hard working person who looked after his family.
He was the eldest of six children and leaves to mourn his wife of 13 years and four children who are six, four, two and nine months old.
