Days after calling slain Agricola youth Shaquille Grant a criminal, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) yesterday apologised saying that there was no justification for the statement made.
“The Party offers an unequivocal apology to the mother of Shaquille Grant for this unfounded assertion and for any hurt and harm caused”, a press release said.
The PPP said that it has noted the call for an apology by Grant’s mother concerning a statement issued in the name of the party in which the youth was “wrongly deemed a criminal”. The release said that a clarification was sought at the weekly press conference of the Party where the General Secretary Clement Rohee in response had promised to ascertain the veracity of the contents of the statement.
“The party has since done so and has determined that there is no justification in describing Shaquelle Grant as a criminal”, the release said.
The Party last Thursday evening issued a statement bashing main opposition party A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) and accusing it of being “in bed with the criminal underworld.”
In its release, the PPP pointed to APNU leader David Granger and noted his attendance at “the funeral of a criminal killed by police.” This funeral alluded to was that of Grant.
Grant, of Lot 72 ‘BB’ Eccles, East Bank Demerara, was killed in September, 2012 on the eve of his 18th birthday. According to the police, ranks on a mobile police patrol came under fire from a group of men at Caesar Street, Agricola sometime around 11 am. The ranks returned fire and fatally wounded Grant while wounding another young man, Romel Bollers, 19. A post-mortem examination revealed that the teen was shot three times.
Several persons have since discounted the police’s version of the events, including Bollers. According to Bollers, the police walked up to him and his friends and placed them to lie on their faces. “Them man just come up, put gun to we head and without asking anything shoot me friend behind he head,” he said.
Bollers recounted that the police accused the young men of planning a robbery but according to him, he and his friends had been “liming” on the corner all morning.
Three cops were later charged with murder but only one appeared in the Magistrate’s Court. In December, 2012 Police constable Terrence Wallace was committed to stand trial. His colleagues Lance Corporal Warren Blue and Special Constable Jamal Lewis remain at large.
