A Cornelia Ida woman was left bloodied and traumatised after she and her two children were attacked by two bandits during an attempted robbery on Wednesday.
Gail Atkinson, of Cornelia Ida, West Coast Demerara, told Stabroek News that the attack, in which she was beaten, occurred after she had arrived home around 6.55PM with her two children, a son, 12-years-old, and a daughter, five-years-old.
“I drove in the yard and I unpacked their stuff from the car and they were taking them inside. At the moment I was teaching my son how to park and so I told him to go take out the stuff and I will straighten the car,” Atkinson related, with her voice intermittently breaking.
She explained that after she parked the car and was walking to her gate to lock it, she noticed two men approaching the yard. She related that the men were wearing black clothes and hats. “I seh ‘yo, yo wha happen?’ And he tek out a gun and seh shut yuh (expletive) mouth and I seh it again and they run in the yard,” the still traumatised woman explained.
Atkinson recalled that while one of the men rushed to her, the one who was armed with the gun rushed to the door where her son was standing. “After he try to run in the house, my son lash he with the backpack and he tek the gun and lash he in he head,” she said. She added that after the bandit hit her son to his head, he grabbed him by his shirt and dragged him into the house, all the while demanding gold and cash.
At that time, Atkinson was wrestling with the other attacker. “The other one wanted to bring me inside but me and he start to fight outside and I calling for the neighbours and fighting he,” she recalled, while stating that she fought with the bandit for about 15 minutes in the yard before the other one came from the house and joined in the attack.
“He grab me and push me to the fence and take the gun and start beating me in my head. He kept saying, ‘Where the (expletive) money and gold?’ And he put the gun to my head and tell me he gon kill me and then he point the gun in the air and fire about four shots and then start back beating and asking for the gold and money,” she recalled as she broke down into tears.
“He kept saying [he] gon shoot me and kill me and I tell he well shoot me and done ’cause I don’t have any gold or money. I look at the other one and I seh the blood of Jesus and he said, ‘Buddy, let we cut out.’ And they jump on a bicycle and ride away,” she added.
Seconds after the two men, Atkinson said she grabbed her children, put them in the car and sped away to the police station. She explained that the police related to her that she had to go to the hospital to treat her wounds and she complied. However, after being treated at the hospital, where she received seven stitches to her head, Atkinson lamented that the police did not visit her until more than 10 hours after to take a statement on the attack.
“It’s terrible. I don’t know what’s going on in this country and I don’t even feel safe going home anymore,” she said.
Atkinson related that while the men ransacked the entire house, they did not take anything. She added that her husband works in the interior and that might have been the reason why the men came to her house in search of gold.
While the children did not suffer any serious injuries, the woman related that they are “very traumatised.”
