The Automated Fingerprint Information System has resulted in the arrest of a suspect in the 2011 murder of Robb Street pharmacist Harold Rachpaul.
According to Crime Chief Seelall Persaud this piece of equipment which was donated to the Guyana Police Force by the US could prove to be very useful.
Based on what was explained, detectives found a match when they used the piece of equipment
to compare a fingerprint recovered from the scene with what was in the Force’s data base.
Persaud informed Stabroek News yesterday that after the match was made, the suspect was detained on Wednesday night.
Another man Ryan Kissoon, called `Dhal Belly’ was arrested last September but he was subsequently released on bail.
According to the crime chief, the fingerprint system was installed last week after a period of training and downloading of data. He said that since then there have been a few breakthroughs in a number of break and enter and larceny offences and two murder investigations.
He said too that along with the system the Force was also given four scanners which would allow for a person’s fingerprint to be scanned on the spot and be immediately entered into the machine’s date base. One scanner each has been placed at police stations in Berbice, Cove and John, Brickdam and Force Head-quarters, Eve Leary. He said that the new protocol would be that prisoners would have their prints entered into the data base. The 84-year-old Rajpaul was murdered on August 19, 2011. It was his son Leonard and grandson Vincent who stumbled upon his lifeless body when they arrived at the Lot 75 Robb Street location to open the shop. This was shortly before 8am.
His hands were also tied in front of him and he was gagged. A vault in the pharmacy was open and money stored there was missing.
The pharmacy had also been tumbled up.
Kissoon’s name was called after a woman reported seeing the man exiting Rachpaul’s yard around 4am on the day that Rajpaul was found, as she was on her way to the market.
At the time, the woman related, the suspect was wearing a pair of short pants. However, when police visited Kissoon’s home he had already fled.
