The gunman who shot teenager Ashmini Harriram dead, first snatched her cellphone and after heading to his getaway car then turned back, pointed his weapon beneath her chin and pulled the trigger, an eyewitness said yesterday.
Up to press time last night the police had not located the gunman or the burgundy coloured car (not red as was reported before) which he had fled the scene in. Footage from a surveillance camera mounted on a nearby building has reportedly yielded very few clues. Stabroek News was told that because of the angle of the camera, the scene of the shooting was out of range. All that the camera recorded was cars driving on the roadway in front of the building. This newspaper was told that the licence plate numbers for the passing vehicles were not visible in the footage.
Questions have been raised as to the motive for the killing. Relatives are insisting that the 18-year-old cosmetologist had no known enemies or problems that would have resulted in such a cruel death. Though a cell phone was snatched from the teen, the circumstances under which she was shot leave room for speculation as to whether there was more to the shooting.
When Stabroek News revisited the area yesterday an eyewitness recounted what they had seen. According to the eyewitness, Harriram and her cousin were heading east along the Lusignan Railway Embankment when a burgundy coloured car passed them and stopped. The car was heading in the same direction.
The eyewitness said that from their vantage point it appeared as though the teen was on her cellular phone and as it approached the now stationary vehicle, a man got out of the passenger front seat. “He walk up to she (Ashmini) snatch she phone and he go back to de car but he ain’t jump in. He turn back, tek three step, point he gun underneath hey [pointing to the bottom of the chin] and shoot.” According to the eyewitness the man then calmly walked back to the vehicle