Guyanese Bishop suspected of killing female pastor during quarrel in Trinidad

(Trinidad Guardian) A bish­op want­ed for the mur­der of Ch­agua­nas pas­tor Al­isa Ali was ar­rest­ed by po­lice last evening, as he tried to hide out in a friend’s home in San­gre Grande hours af­ter killing Ali and leav­ing a knife lodged in her face.

Homicide detectives were told that the suspect is a Guyanese national with military training.

The mur­der was com­mit­ted in Ali’s bed­room, lo­cat­ed be­hind the St Michael’s Di­vine Heal­ing Taber­na­cle church at Gill Trace, La­m­ont Av­enue, Long­denville, on Sat­ur­day night.

Rel­a­tives said the mur­der was the cul­mi­na­tion of years of in­fi­deli­ty, de­ceit and be­tray­al.

The mur­der was wit­nessed by Ali’s 10-year-old grand­daugh­ter, who told po­lice the sus­pect used a blue-han­dled bread knife to stab Ali four times in her chest be­fore plung­ing it deep in­to her face.

Leav­ing Ali mo­tion­less and the grand­child scream­ing, the sus­pect then ran down Gill Trace and board­ed a white Mit­subishi Lancer which was wait­ing for him high­er up the road.

In an in­ter­view yes­ter­day, Ali’s son-in-law Akeem Charles said he was now wor­ried about his daugh­ter and the trau­ma she had suf­fered from wit­ness­ing the mur­der.

“She used to sleep with moms every night. When she start­ed to bawl I ran in and saw moms bleed­ing. I ran out and got the car. I put her in and we took her to the Ch­agua­nas Health Fa­cil­i­ty but she was al­ready dead,” Charles said.

He ex­plained that the sus­pect and Ali had been ar­gu­ing be­fore the mur­der.

“He told us some­thing was go­ing to hap­pen here tonight. He kept say­ing, ‘The spir­it will have to vex with me tonight. No man com­ing to dri­ve up in my car,’” Charles re­called, say­ing he nev­er liked to deal up in do­mes­tic busi­ness and be­lieved Ali and the man would sort out their dif­fer­ences.

An­oth­er friend, Al­daine Good­win, said Ali want­ed to end her re­la­tion­ship with the man. He said af­ter speak­ing to an­oth­er woman she made up her mind.

“I came here around 7 pm and they were ar­gu­ing. (Name called) was say­ing he don’t want it to end. When he came out, I say ‘Aye was the scene.’ He told me I al­ready know what is the scene be­cause Al­isa al­ready told me what go­ing on,” Good­win said.

He ex­plained that Ali had con­fid­ed in him a year ago that she was the vic­tim of in­fi­deli­ty. But Good­win said he told the man not to do any­thing rash.

“He told me he is go­ing Bras­so to kill the oth­er woman. Ap­par­ent­ly, she and Al­isa had start­ed talk­ing so she knew what was play­ing off,” Good­win re­called.

He added that the sus­pect nev­er ap­peared vi­o­lent and his ac­tions were ob­vi­ous­ly planned in ad­vance. Good­win ex­plained that the sus­pect went to To­ba­go to do a ma­son­ry con­struc­tion project and came back un­ex­pect­ed­ly on Sat­ur­day.

Ali’s niece, Reese Williams, said the sense­less mur­der had left them heart­bro­ken. De­scrib­ing Ali as a car­ing and com­pas­sion­ate per­son, Williams said she of­ten helped every­one in her com­mu­ni­ty.

“She was a lov­ing and giv­ing per­son. If you asked her for help, she would help you,” Williams said.

An­oth­er youth said last year a man came in­to the church with a gun­shot wound and Ali took him to the back room and knifed out the bul­let.

“Her two daugh­ters…loved her but Ak­i­la moved out last year be­cause she did not like how her moth­er was be­ing treat­ed,” the rel­a­tive said.

An au­top­sy will be done on Ali’s body to­day at the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre, St James. The sus­pect will ap­pear on ID pa­rades, af­ter which he will be charged with mur­der pend­ing in­struc­tions from the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions. Homi­cide of­fi­cers are con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions.