Several students got the shock of their young lives yesterday afternoon when they stumbled upon the bound and gagged body of an elderly sweets vendor at her home.
Najiean Sadick, known as ‘Khirul Rajidam’ and ‘Aunty,’ 73, of Lot 2115 Gauling Place, South Ruimveldt Park, was found with her hands and feet bound and a gag placed in her mouth. Police, in a brief statement, said last evening that an investigation had been launched into the circumstances surrounding the woman’s death.
According to reports, shortly after school was dismissed, a few students of the South Ruimveldt Secondary School ventured into the woman’s yard to purchase confectionaries and finger foods.
After making several calls, the students stumbled upon the woman’s body on her kitchen floor on the bottom flat of her home. She had been strangled.
A piece of netting material was tied around the woman’s neck while her hands were tied at the back with a piece of cloth.
Sadick made a living by selling food items to passers-by and yesterday afternoon a bowl with ‘pickled mango’ along with a knife was discovered in a chair close to the entrance of her kitchen.
The police were called in after the discovery was made.
The upper flat of the woman’s house was ransacked and her belongings were emptied out of her wardrobe and cupboards.
A Fifth form student of the secondary school, who was among the party of students that made the gruesome discovery, told Stabroek News that she and her friends entered the woman’s yard shortly after school was dismissed. She said, “When we go in, we ain’t see ‘Aunty,’ so we call out but she ain’t respond.” She said that one of her colleagues, sensing something was amiss, pushed open the woman’s kitchen door and her body was subsequently discovered close to the entrance of the small room, lying face down.
She said that an alarm was raised and persons began to converge on the scene as others notified the police.
According to a neighbour, Sadick, who lived alone for more than 19 years following the passing of her husband, was last seen around 1 pm yesterday.
As usual, students of the nearby secondary school had stopped to purchase food items.
The neighbor said that no one knew what transpired at the woman’s home between 1 and 3 pm.
However, persons at the scene said a young woman, who was passing the home shortly before the discovery, observed three men in the yard.
The neighbor noted that Sadick would usually leave her gate open so that her customers, mainly school children, would enter to make their purchases.
He said that from all appearances the woman’s attackers had planned the incident, while noting that the woman would usually be alone during the afternoons and the street is usually quiet at that time of the day.
One of Sadick’s nephews at the scene yesterday noted that since her husband died, she kept to herself. He noted, however, that from time to time she would visit the masjid and interact with old friends. The woman had no children.
Her body is at the Lyken’s Funeral Home in the city, awaiting a post-mortem examination.
