A seamstress of No. 12 Village, West Coast Berbice said she was humiliated after the police went to her home on Saturday and took her to the Fort Wellington Station because she demanded payment for her work.
Ameen Latiff told Stabroek News that a woman who works at the region had ordered two bridesmaids’ gowns and got three other persons to order as well.
She had told the woman that one dress would cost $5,000. She even said she would be willing to give her a reduction. She told Stabroek News that the woman agreed to pay the cost and she collected the fabric.
Contacted, the woman said the seamstress never told her how much the dresses would cost and it was not a case that she did not want to pay for them.
Latiff, a single mother, said she worked tirelessly to finish the outfits in time for the wedding on Saturday.
She said the woman sent three girls for three of the dresses without the money and at first she did not want to hand them over.
To this, the woman told this newspaper that she did not know the girls would have gone for the dresses without the money. She said she was planning to go for the dresses herself and she would have paid for them.
At the time that the girls went for the outfits, a resident who recommended the woman was at her house helping her with the finishing touches and she contacted her by telephone. She promised to take the payment later and told her to send the dresses but after receiving them the woman called her to say she could not pay $5,000.
The seamstress said she commented that “this is a wedding and you don’t want to pay? You would cross the wedding.”
Latiff said this must have gotten the woman angry and she telephoned her again and told her a police officer would like to speak to her.
Latiff said she refused to speak to the person “because anyone can pose as a police…” Before long, a police car pulled up in front of her house and told her she was wanted at the Fort Wellington Station.
She refused to go and the police told her “woman you have to go to the station now because the [senior police] officer wants to see you….”
She lamented that it was a “public embarrassment” because a lot of vehicles stopped and many residents came out to watch as the police were taking her away.
She noted that they treated her like a criminal and she admitted that in her anger and frustration she made a racist remark which she was sorry for.
Meanwhile, the woman denied that she was the one who called the police on the seamstress. She said too that the seamstress could not account for fabric for one of the dresses.
