A taxi driver was discovered dead in his car yesterday morning at Goedverwagting Road, Plaisance, on the East Coast Demerara—prompting the drivers’ association to urge operators to exercise more caution when picking up fares.
Marc Small, 49, of Sunset Hotel, David Street, Kitty, who was attached to the GT Express Taxi Service based on Sheriff Street, was found in a trench near to his yellow cab, HB 7962, which had partially plunged into the said trench. There were six stab wounds about his body.
A police source told this newspaper that one woman has since been taken into custody and is assisting with investigations at the Sparendaam Police Station.
According to Kunta Thornhill, of Green Ice Cabs, he had just picked up a customer around 01:48am and used the Goedverwagting main road to return to Georgetown when he noticed the car in the trench.
“I saw the car and the door was wide open, the driver side one, so I didn’t know what service it belonged to but the number was on the rear end of the car so I decide to call and a female answered, collected my number and said she’ll call the boss and he’ll get back on to me,” he recalled.
He further stated that he decided to reverse and turn on his hi-beam lights to get a clearer view but saw no one. “I was told this morning that he was submerged in the water so I couldn’t see him,” the man said, adding that Small’s boss, Wayne De Abreu, subsequently contacted him for directions to the location of the vehicle. He noted that the area was completely isolated.
The vehicle was picked up by police and taken to the Sparendaam Police Station while Small’s body was transported to the Lyken’s Funeral home, where it will be kept until it is claimed by relatives, who, up to press time had not come forward. According to sources, police identified the man by his driver’s licence, which was found in the car.
Persons living near the area where the car was found indicated that the street is usually very dark and desolate.
One woman, who gave her name as Nathalie, said that she neither heard nor saw anything unusual. She explained that she woke up some time around 6 am and heard people in the village talking about the incident. However, by that time, she said, the vehicle had already been removed and only the skid marks leading to the trench were visible.
The man is reportedly from Lusignan, East Coast Demerara but moved to the city hotel, where he occupied Room 18, to be closer to his job. He had been employed at the taxi service since November of last year and had previously worked in the same field.
‘Security’
According to the President of the Guyana Taxi Driver’s Association Patrick Brassington, the last communication between Small and the service’s dispatcher was around 11:00 pm, when he indicated that he had picked up a passenger on Regent Street and was heading to Plaisance. He said that the pick-up was a male passenger.
Taxi drivers are often targeted by armed robbers and near the end of last year there were over a dozen incidents in which drivers were carjacked by a lone robber posing as a customer.
“We talk to drivers about security and most drivers who pick up [passengers] on the road, it’s just a spur of the moment they have to react on whether to pick up,” he added.
Brasssington opined that the motive was robbery of the car. The radio set, which is said to worth in excess of $100,000, was missing. He also pointed out that the car belonged to the taxi service.
“I must emphasise to the public that taxi operators don’t move with large sums of cash. The value we have is usually the car and radio set. If its cash you are looking for, we are the wrong set of people you are targeting. The Guyana Taxi Driver’s Association would like to urge all taxi operators to be very cautious,” he stated.
Also, Brassington called on dealers in spare parts retail and workshop businesses to desist from purchasing parts that were not imported or from an authorized dealer.
“Stop buying stolen parts from anyone because you are just fuelling these guys to continue doing this operation,” he pleaded, adding that he is of the opinion that the attacker intended to steal the car and strip it of its parts.
