(Trinidad Express) – The husband of 37-year-old kidnap victim Giselle Balkaran-Phillip was shot dead by police on Wednesday where they had gone to rescue her from a house in La Brea.
Andre “Rabbit” Phillip, who was released from prison two months ago, was shot in the chest. He was pronounced dead at the Point Fortin District Hospital.
A team of police officers, who had been searching for the mother of two, went to a two-storey concrete house at Lagoondor, La Brea, around 2.30 p.m.
A woman was heard screaming out for help inside the house, police said. However, they were attacked by a raging pitbull, investigators said. The animal was silenced with a bullet.
And as the officers entered the house, police said Phillip emerged from a bedroom, firing shots. The officers responded, hitting the 38-year-old man. A .38 revolver was allegedly recovered.
Balkaran-Phillip was found in a bedroom. She was taken to the Point Fortin District Hospital, where she was treated and released into the arms of her waiting children.
Balkaran-Phillip had run away from an abusive relationship and was hiding at her mother’s Warden Road, Point Fortin, home, when two masked men snatched her last week Wednesday.
Phillip, her husband, was identified as the driver of the getaway car, police said.
He crashed the car into a ditch and commandeered a passing vehicle. The car was found abandoned along South Central Road, Guapo, that afternoon.
Police had searched the bushes for Balkaran-Phillip and alerted the Coast Guard, as investigators believed an attempt would have been made to take the woman to Venezuela.
However, officers were informed on Wednesday that Balkaran-Phillip was being held captive in a house in La Brea.
Police said Balkaran-Phillip was kidnapped three years ago and taken to Grenada. She escaped and returned home several weeks later.
Her daughter, Nikifa Phillip, said yesterday her mother had endured many years of abuse at her father’s hands and wanted to escape.
“He never left her alone. He always followed her and tried to get her back,” she said.
Phillip had 40 previous convictions, ranging from drug offences to kidnapping, police said.
