A three-year-old girl is dead after being fatally run down by a motorcyclist at Windsor Forest, West Coast Demerara on Friday afternoon.
Saleena Shakieal, known as ‘Soonie,’ a student of the Precious Buds Play School, succumbed around 10.30 pm at the West Demerara Regional Hospital.
The rider of the motorcycle, who lives in the area, fled the scene after the accident. He has since turned himself into the police with a lawyer.
Police said yesterday that the accident occurred at about 5.40 pm, while the child and her mother, Yashwantie Kallap, 29, were standing along the roadway. “…The driver of a motorcycle lost control of the vehicle and crashed into them,” police reported, adding that they sustained injuries and were taken to the West Demerara Regional Hospital, where the child later succumbed.
The rider fled the scene, leaving the motorbike, which was impounded by the police.
The motorcyclist was said to be unlicensed and under the influence of alcohol. Eyewitnesses also told Stabroek News that the bike had no lights. The dead girl’s family is questioning if the lights may have made a difference, since Saleena may have been able to see the bike approaching and remove herself from harm’s way. But witnesses noted that the place was still bright at the time of the accident.
Kallap yesterday told Stabroek News that she was standing with Saleena and an older daughter behind a grocery truck at the corner of the road. The motorcyclist, she said, was speeding and lost control of the bike and hit them. The woman, who then felt blood running down her face, soon realised one of her worst fears when she turned around and saw Saleena lying motionless under the truck.
Kallap recalled yelling for her husband, who was standing on the bridge in front of their nearby home. She said her husband ran to her assistance, while the motorcyclist, who was still on his bike and could be heard asking, “How much of dem dead?”
Saleena’s father, Sheik Shakieal, 35, said that he picked up his daughter and took her to their residence at 180 Sixth Street, Windsor Forest. He said he soaked her with water to try to revive her and she took a breath and started to groan as if in pain.
Shakieal, who wept as he spoke with this newspaper, said a taxi was called to take the girl to the hospital, where doctors started trying to get her in a stable condition in order for a transfer to the Georgetown Public Hospital for further medical treatment.
He said her last words to him were, “Hice meh nah daddy. Meh nah want stay here. Meh want go home.” She lost consciousness around 8 pm and was placed in intensive care and hooked up to a life support machine.
The father said that Saleena’s heart suddenly failed and the doctors were trying the revive her but they soon informed him that she was gone.
According to her parents, in the accident Saleena sustained several head injuries, broken ribs and collar bone, bruises to her lips and mouth and holes above and below her eyes for which she received stitches.
Her family remembered Saleena as a loving child, who liked to laugh, give hugs and make jokes. She will be buried either tomorrow or Tuesday according to Muslim rites.
“The hardest thing a parent can do is to bury their child so young,” the dead child’s grandmother Zaleena Hakh said.
