The father of an Anna Catherina businesswoman who along with her two small children was brutally murdered in 2012, is adamant that there was political interference in the investigation and is optimistic that the new government would ensure that it is steered back on course.
Kumar Persaud still feels the effects of the deaths but expressed certainty that justice will done one day. His immediate plan is to visit Attorney General Basil Williams and Minister of National Security Khemraj Ramjattan to relate his plight and to ask for the case to be given some priority.
During a recent interview with Stabroek News, the man said that the prime suspect in the case is connected to two senior members of the former government. He said he could not come forward prior to now but feels confident and empowered with the change in government.
On September 22, 2012 Jennifer Persaud, 41, and her sons Afridi Bacchus, 6, and Jadon Persaud, 18 months, were discovered in the bedroom of her West Coast Demerara home with stab wounds and their throats slit. The woman was found lying in a pool of blood on her bed, clad in nightwear, with the body of the older child between her legs. The infant was found wrapped up in the netting.
The father of the youngest child, who is a 23-year-old deportee was suspected of being the mastermind of the attack. The man was arrested and kept in custody for several days along with an uncle he was living with at the time.
Kumar said he gets occasional updates from the police, nothing substantial. The last time was about a month ago when a rank said that samples which were sent abroad have not yet been returned. The samples were part of a batch which was set to a lab in Brazil as part of an arrangement with the Guyana Police Force. The samples left Guyana in February last year.
Contacted recently Crime Chief Leslie James said some samples were returned but was unable to say which case they were connected to or what the results were since everything was written in Portuguese. It is unclear when the samples were returned here and how many were returned.
James indicated that he is working on getting the information translated.
Stabroek News has been trying for several months to get information from the police on the samples.
“I want to know why the tests are taking so long,” Kumar said as he expressed disbelief that more than a year after they were sent that no one can say anything about the samples.
He informed that he had visited then Crime Chief Seelall Persaud (the current commissioner of police) and it was he who informed him officially that samples had left. It is unknown what exactly was sent to Brazil in this case as according to Kumar no DNA samples were taken from him or his wife.
Kumar said that based on what police told him during the initial stages of the investigation three samples were taken from his daughter’s bed, the floor and from the bathroom where it appeared that the killer/s attempted to wash off blood. He said too that police took samples from a trail of blood leading from the bedroom and down the stairs. Kumar expressed the view that the droplets belonged to the killer who may have been wounded when his daughter put up a struggle. Police, he said also cut out a piece of a man’s pants which was found in the house and which had blood on it. He could not say if the police took a sample of pants found at the alleged mastermind’s home, which had blood on it. The man had claimed that it was “fowl blood” and it was later said that there was not enough blood on the garment to do any testing.
He said while he knew several samples were taken by the police, he is unsure if all were sent to Brazil.
During his visit to Seelall Persaud, he said it was made clear that it could not be ascertained when the results will be available as several items were sent to be tested.
He insisted that the police were unable to execute their duties well since “they were being trampled by power.” He said that shortly after the murder, the suspect’s mother travelled to Guyana and it was after she left that the police developed a lax attitude. He said the suspect has seemingly moved on with his life and is now living with a woman.
According to Kumar, the police missed opportunities where they could have gathered information vital to the case. He recalled that the police were informed about a telephone conversation between Persaud’s mother Sankhaori and the suspect’s mother who had called from overseas. During the conversation, the suspect’s mother reportedly identified the killer just before the phone was apparently snatched from her hand and the call ended. Kumar said that although the police were told about this conversation no attempt was ever made to check phone records to verify that a call was made to his landline phone from overseas the day after the murders occurred.
“They [the police] should have had some collaboration with the US people but because of the political nature of things nothing was happening. I am sure that with this change of government this case will move in the right direction,” he stressed.
He said too that he had informed police about a woman who claimed she was drinking with Persaud in her shop, the night before the bodies were found. The woman, who he described as a maid who would do household chores for his daughter, was never questioned by the police. He said the rank who he had informed about this later indicated that he had not received any instructions from his superior as it related to the information he had provided. “She might have been able to provide some clues. She might have vital information,” he stressed.
He made it clear that he will not be revisiting the police for any information because “it ain’t mek sense.” He believes that approaching members of the government directly will get him better results.
The man said he had gone to the former attorney general Anil Nandlall and former home affairs minister Clement Rohee for help but got nowhere. “It was being ducked for political reasons. I am hurt that nobody thought it best to get to the bottom of this matter. I lost a daughter plus two grandchildren,” he said adding that his wife cries every time she sees a report of a murder in the news.
Certainty
Kumar expressed certainty that it was someone close to her daughter who committed the act. Explaining the rationale being his suspicions, he said that after the bodies were found it was discovered that the wiring connecting a transporter to an inverter in the upper flat had been plugged out.
He was adamant that it had to have been done by someone who was very familiar with the house. According to Kumar, the person who he suspects has been boasting about his actions.
“I will not rest until I get justice,” he said before calling on anyone who has information on the case to come forward.
The police have been heavily criticized for their sloppy investigation into these murders. Director of Public Prosecutions Shalimar Ali-Hack had berated the police over their investigation into serious crimes, saying that case files show “poor and inadequate” work that has left several murders, including all that were committed in ‘D’ Division for 2012 unsolved. On the list was the triple murder.
Though there has been no movement in the investigation, Kumar said he knows he will get justice one day and will do everything in his power to ensure that he gets it.
