Five heavily armed bandits robbed the Alesie Group of Companies office at Ruimzigt, West Coast Demerara of almost $4 million after beating and tying up the security guards and torching the lock on an iron cabinet.
The robbery, which occurred around midnight on Thursday, saw the bandits spending close to one hour at the premises, after which they escaped with cash, four laptops, LCD monitors, cell phones and flash drives. They also took the recording from a surveillance camera.
One of the security guards, Kadarnauth, had started to scream when he saw the bandits and they rushed towards him and started hitting him to his head.
Chief Executive Officer of the company Jai Keswani told Stabroek News that the guard lost consciousness and the bandits tied him. When he came to, he saw one of the bandits pointing a gun at him.
He attempted to call out to the other guard, Josai, to find out where he was but the bandit threatened to shoot him if he didn’t remain quiet. Later he realised that the other guard was tied close to him also.
Meanwhile, the other bandits used a “gas cutter” to cut the lock on an iron cabinet, causing important papers that were stored in it to get burned.
Keshwano said that he received a call about the robbery around 1am yesterday and he hurried to the scene.
He said that even though the police arrived within half an hour, he was disappointed that they did not set up roadblocks or conduct searches in the area. The police returned yesterday to continue further investigation.
Head of Alesie Turhane Doerga said “much more needs to be done in terms of security. If businesses would be targeted like this, what would happen?”
He said the robbery is a big blow to the company and recalled that about six weeks ago thieves had broken into a container and stolen $1.5 million worth of spare parts. The matter was reported to the police at Leonora but there has been no progress in the case.
