Police are yet to arrest a suspect in the murder of 75-year-old Joyce Lewis who was found dead in her North Ruimveldt home two weeks ago, a police source said.
Lewis’s body was discovered in her bedroom with her underwear pulled down to her ankles. There were also marks of strangulation around her neck. She is believed to have been choked to death during an early morning robbery.
Her body was discovered by police and her sister, Veronica Deen around 8.30 am. The intruders had pried their way into the two-storey home some time between 12am and 6am.
They had gained entry through a window near the veranda of the house after an attempt to clip a window grill barring entry into the lower flat of her home had failed.
Recently, residents of the area said that the number of robberies in North Ruimveldt had risen.
Shane Willis, Lewis’s cousin said he received a call from another cousin, asking him to check on her house because she was not answering her phone. He said when he jumped the fence of her home he saw a knife wrapped up in a cloth and a bunch of keys on the ground.
A close friend of Lewis said she spoke to her around midnight and they made plans to go shopping the next day but when she called around 6 am the phone rang out and a few hours later she received a call that she had been murdered.
A relative told Stabroek News that Lewis had a man who did odd jobs in the area, clean her yard, and that he was the only person who visited the house regularly.
