(TrinidadExpress) “If the court didn’t take my children away from me, they would have been alive today.”
These were the words of Selvon Reyes, the husband of Vonetta Haynes-Reyes and father of their children, Malik and Makasi, who were found murdered at theirPlumbago Avenue, La Horquetta, home on Thursday.
The mother and sons were discovered murdered in separate bedrooms by police officers, who kicked down a side door to get in on Thursday.
Reyes, speaking in an interview with TV6’s Crime Watch host, Ian Alleyne, at hisOropuneGardens, Piarco, home yesterday, said he last saw his happy children on Wednesday night. He said he and Haynes-Reyes had been separated for four years and she was given custody of their children by the courts.
According to Reyes, his wife enjoyed a social life and didn’t pay much attention to the welfare of their children, which took a toll on the life of his family. He said he turned almost everywhere for help, but none was forthcoming.
“…I tried to knock on so much doors for help, I couldn’t get help. I went to some counselling thing for men, but no help. I was frustrated. My supervisor on work keep telling me, ‘Hey, get your act together on the job.’ It was hard. It was very, very hard.
“To make it worse, I was raising the kids and she left, and I raised the kids, and I say well okay, I am seeing about the kids, I will go and file for custody.
“She (Haynes-Reyes) went to the court and the magistrate asked her, ‘Ma’am, you want your children? She told the magistrate yes, and the magistrate say, ‘Sir, give the woman her children,'” Reyes added.
The last time he saw his children was on Wednesday night, when he picked them up from a day-care centre and took them to his home. “I had no problem with her because we had an understanding,” Reyes said.
Haynes-Reyes, he said, would normally come from work and take the children to her home after he picked them up from the day-care centre on afternoons.
“If the court didn’t take my children away from me, they would have been alive today,” he said.
Police officers were left to guard the house late on Thursday night and crime scene investigators returned to the house yesterday and continued their search for clues.
A post-mortem conducted yesterday revealed that Haynes-Reyes died from puncture wounds to the front and back of her neck, while her sons died from chop wounds to the neck.
Up to late yesterday, police were pursuing several leads and promised an arrest would be made soon. Officers are working on the theory that the incident may have been domestic in nature.
Haynes-Reyes and her sons were found by La Horquetta police around 3.05 p.m. on Thursday, after officers responded to a report by a relative that the mother and children were seen dead inside their house.
Police said the relative told them that after attempts to reach Haynes-Reyes on her cellphone proved futile, he went to the residence and peeked through a bedroom window and saw the woman’s body in a pool of blood.
Officers said a resident observed Haynes-Reyes’s white B12 motorcar leaving the area around 2 a.m. on Thursday, but could not recognise the driver of the vehicle.
Officers are working on the theory that the killings may have taken place shortly before Haynes-Reyes’s car was seen leaving her driveway. The car was found late on Thursday night in a dirt track off theCarapo Main Roadby officers of the Northern Division CID.
The vehicle, police said, which was closed and intact, was later taken to the Special Anti-Crime Unit of T&T’s laboratory in Cumuto to be processed.
The triple-killings are being probed by Sgt Kirt Simon of the Region II Homicide Bureau of Investigations, who is being supervised by Snr Supt Donald Denoon, head of the Homicide Bureau of Investigations (HBI) and ASP Kenrick Edwards.
