In the wake of the Charlestown chopping rampage which left two dead and two injured citizens have raised concerns about homeless persons especially those who appear to suffer from psychiatric disorders and roam the city carrying sharp implements.
These homeless persons, especially those who are drug users or suffer from mental ailments, pose a great danger to passers-by and something should be done to get them off the streets, Charlestown residents told Stabroek News yesterday morning.
Just before 10 am on Tuesday William Light, went on a cutlass-wielding rampage which left two persons dead and two injured. The man also chased many other residents in the Russell and Howes streets area.
Light, an officer close to the investigation told Stabroek News yesterday afternoon, is yet to be psychiatrically evaluated. The man’s mental state must first be determined, the source explained, before a decision is made about what his fate will be.
It is based on this evaluation that it will be decided whether Light is fit to face criminal charges and trial. The 42-year-old man remained in police custody yesterday.
Residents said they saw Light sharpening a cutlass for three consecutive days. Akeem Prince, a Howes Street resident, said that Light had told him he wasn’t feeling well and that there were forces controlling his mind. Light, according to Akeem, had requested that he pray for him.
When Stabroek News revisited the Charlestown area yesterday residents were trying to carry on their routines and offer what little comfort they could to the grieving families of Cedric Blackman and Ann Cham-A-Koon.
Many, still upset at the recent horror that unfolded on Russell Street, voiced concern about persons of “questionable mental health” walking around with dangerous materials that can be used as weapons.
“Let me tell you something that you know already,” one resident stated, “Georgetown is a mad, mad, mad place. It got a set of crazy people walking around with cutlass and sharp pieces of wood and other things like that…let me give you one example. It got this man that does be at Camp and Regent (streets) and he always got a piece of wood in his hand and when he beg you for money and you can’t give he, you better make sure you deh far from he.”
During the return journey from Charlestown to Robb Street this newspaper observed three homeless persons; one was armed with a long metal rod and the other two were carrying pieces of wood. One of the men is often seen walking along Robb Street and employees from businesses in the area have described him as a “junkie” who does odd jobs for a reasonable price. It is this sort of character about whom Charlestown residents spoke out and who they said they now have more reason to fear.
“Now if I see a man looking unkempt and mental then I am not walking anywhere next to him because now I know there is no telling,” a woman, who witnessed part of the brutal rampage from her verandah, said.
Minister of Human Services, Priya Manickchand when contacted about this issue yesterday directed this newspaper to the Ministry of Health. Manickchand explained that once a homeless person has a psychiatric disorder then they fall outside her ministry’s realm. The Ministry of Human Services, she said, does not have the facilities to take in and provide the care needed for such persons.
Several efforts made to contact Minister of Health Leslie Ramsammy for a comment were futile.
Blackman, 72, a distant relative of the cutlass wielding attacker was the first to be hacked to death while having breakfast in his Lot 57 Russell and Howes streets home. Light then proceeded to chase after Blackman’s son-in-law who managed to escape. His next victim was Radesh Persaud, 41, of Lot 38 Russell Street who he chopped to the head before returning to Russell and Howes streets where he murdered 38-year-old Ann Cham-A-Koon. Mechanic Sean DeSouza was the last to be injured by the man. He sustained chops to the neck and shoulder.
“We want police to deal with
this seriously…”
Despite warnings from her relatives Cham-A-Koon had left her Lot 60 Russell Street house to get a closer look at what was happening on Tuesday morning. Her relatives have since expressed dissatisfaction at how police are handling the matter.
“We want police to deal with this seriously,” one of Cham-A-Koon’s relatives told Stabroek News yesterday morning. “We are not satisfied with how they’ve been doing things so far…yesterday [Tuesday] when my niece [Cham-A-Koon’s daughter Rabia Shakoor] went to the police station they put her to sit right near that mad man who murdered her mother.”
This, the woman said, was not professional of the police. She further explained that because they could not locate the police officer who took the statements Cham-A-Koon’s post-mortem examination had to be postponed yesterday and will most likely be conducted on Friday. The woman further said that she is aware that because of Light’s questionable mental state there is a possibility that police may not be able to charge him for the crime. However, the woman insists that Light is not “insane” as many people are saying.
“Yesterday when the police come this man put down his cutlass and I hear him tell the police that his deed was done and that he was finished now,” the woman said.
“…it was fight or die…”
Persaud, 41, was discharged from GPH after being treated for abrasions to the knees and a chop to the top of the head.
On Tuesday morning, the man recalled, he was walking along Russell Street. He heard a commotion and when he turned around to look he saw Light chasing after Blackman’s son-in-law.
“This man [Blackman’s son-in-law] run past me and he manage to get away and is then this mad man decide to chase me…at first I didn’t realize that he mean business that is chop he de coming to chop me but the next thing I know I was running for my life,” Persaud told this newspaper from his Russell Street home yesterday morning.
His first thought was to dash into someone’s yard and see if he could hide somewhere, Persaud said. With Light close behind him, the injured man reported, he dashed into a yard next door to Cham-A-Koon’s. It was in that yard, as he tried to jump the fence and failed, that Light was able to chop him to the head.
“When I get that chop I realize that it was fight or die and I wasn’t going to give up my life like that so I tackle he from behind and I manage to throw he to the ground and then I run in the next yard,” the man said.
Once he made it into the next yard he managed to run into a house and lock himself in a room. Persaud said that he stayed in this room for some time before he was finally taken out and rushed to the hospital.
“Girl, if I tell you. It nah got a mad man I walking near to again and I not sure how I walking about this place because it got a set of people just like this one [Light] around the place,” Persaud said.
Meanwhile, De Souza remains a patient at GPH. Sherry De Souza, the man’s wife, told this newspaper that his condition has improved and he has been transferred from the HDU to the Male Surgical Ward.
