Police are yet to arrest anyone for the killing of James Peter, the nurse from India who was fatally stabbed to his neck over a phone as he waited to see the Diwali motorcade.
His friends say that the motive for the murder was robbery. “He told his friends before he died that the person who stabbed him stole his phone,” one friend told Stabroek News yesterday.
Peter was stabbed to his neck on Wednesday night as he and his friends were watching the Diwali motorcade. The friend, who did not want to be identified, related that Peter had stepped away from them as they were walking, to take a call from his girlfriend who was on duty at the time at the Woodlands Hospital.
He recounted that they then saw Peter running to catch up to them, clutching at his bleeding neck. The nurse informed them that he was stabbed and his phone was taken away. The friend said that it was a smart phone.
Commander of ‘A’ Division Clifton Hicken had told Stabroek News the day after, that investigations so far revealed that Peter was out with friends at the seawall and moved away to take a cell phone call.
He returned shortly after with the wound to his neck and informed his friends that he had been stabbed. He was rushed to the Balwant Singh Hospital where he was employed but died shortly after.
A memorial service was held yesterday afternoon for Peter at the Ursuline Chapel at the corner of Camp and Church streets. Several of his coworkers, friends and management of both hospitals where he worked, attended the service and paid tribute to the life of a man they described as loving and friendly.
Peter came to Guyana over five years ago to work as a registered nurse at the Woodlands Hospital. He later sought employment with the Balwant Singh Hospital.
“Not to say because it is this occasion but Peter was different, always smiling always pleasant anyone who says different would be lying,” one friend said. “When he first came, he fit right in, I showed him around, told him which areas are dangerous, where to walk at nights and things like that. It is sad that this has happened to him,” he added.
Hospital staff too reminisced on Peter’s pleasant disposition and lamented the brutal manner in which he died.
Another friend informed that he had no kin in Guyana as a brother who had also worked here, returned to India sometime last year. The friend and co-worker said Peter was pleasant, kind and was always ready to share a joke.
Peter was also in a relationship with a nurse, also from India, and was to be married later this year.
Stabroek News understands that plans are underway to have Peter’s body sent back to his relatives next week to be buried in his homeland.
A section of attendees at a memorial service held yesterday afternoon at the Ursuline Chapel of the Roman Catholic Church, for James Peter, the male nurse who was fatally stabbed last Wednesday night on the Seawall.
