Days after his car was stolen from his garage, Blairmont, West Bank Berbice resident Pooran Sewkaran managed to recover the vehicle on Wednesday abandoned at Mahaica.
Sewkaran, 47, told Stabroek News yesterday that the AT 160 Toyota Corolla PDD 2106 was found abandoned close to a rice field at Cane Grove, Mahaica, with the battery and jack missing. He had parked the car in front of his home as usual before it disappeared. A relative, who was doing delivery in the area, spotted the car on Tuesday and informed him.
A farmer related that the car had careened off the road and ended up in the trench. The young driver, who was the only occupant, asked him to pull it out with his tractor. However, when this was done, the car did not start and the driver then removed the battery and the jack and attempted to sell them to him. The driver later fled in a taxi.
Sewkaran said he towed the car out and parked it at the Mahaica Police Station. After reporting the car stolen at the Blairmont Police Station, he noted that police contacted the Berbice Bridge Company Inc. to inquire whether the car had crossed, but the staff indicated that it could not release the information. Sewkaran said the police called back twice in an effort to get the information but the bridge workers still refused to assist.
Contacted, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the bridge, Omadatt Samaroo said while he has not received information about those calls from the police, the company always cooperates fully with the police. He agreed that they “do not give the public the information” and normally “the commander would have to give me a call and we would provide that information once they [police] request it.” He said that in this case, there may have been “some breakdown in communication.”
The CEO said he prefers if the calls are official and recalled that recently someone called the bridge as it was about to close to say that an ambulance was leaving the hospital to cross. The closing was delayed for half an hour and it turned out that the call was a hoax. They did, however, manage to trace the caller and the matter is being investigated.
