Imran Ramsaywack and Ryan Jones, the two prison escapees who along with a female were fatally wounded on Monday night during a reported shoot-out with the police died as a result of multiple gunshot injuries.
Deputy Director of the Guy-ana Police Force’s Communication Unit, Stan Gouveia confirmed the findings of the autopsies which were performed yesterday by Government Pathologist Dr Nehaul Singh.
The bodies of Ramsaywack and Jones were handed over to officials of the Guyana Prison Service while Savita Rajkumar’s remains were handed over to her relatives.
The three were shot dead in a shack in the backlands of Better Hope South, where police had gone based on a tip-off that the escapees were hiding in the area.
The Guyana Police Force (GPF) in a report had said that that Rajkumar, 49, of Better Hope (South) Squatting area, East Coast Demerara, was said to be a close acquaintance of one of the dead prisoners.
According to the police, ranks went to the area after receiving intelligence that the prison escapees were hiding there.
They observed three wooden shacks in an abandoned field in a bushy and swampy area.
The statement added that after clearing the first shack, ranks were approaching the second one when a voice was heard in the third shack.
The police said they immediately identified themselves after which a man emerged and discharged a round in their direction before escaping.
Police returned fire, killing the three persons in the shack.
A sawn-off double barrel shotgun was found at the scene.
While there has been no word on the identity of the man who initially fired at the police, it is believed that he is one of the remaining two escapees who are still on the run.
During a telephone interview with Stabroek News yesterday, Minister of Home Affairs Robeson Benn said that the police’s use of force in the incident was required since they were fired upon.
“The only insight I have is that there was an operation. It was at night. They (police) were fired upon at night and they returned fire,” Benn said.
Benn said that while the loss of lives is “regrettable”, it ought to be known that the men were “dangerous” criminals, who fled from the country’s most secure prison.
“…The loss of life is regrettable for both the escapees and the lady who died in the situation. It’s regrettable. We don’t want that but I can only imagine and identify that this operation took place at night and they were fired upon and there has to be an awareness that these are dangerous criminals from the high security section of the most secured prison in the country,” Benn stated.
“…they fired upon the police and fire was returned,” he added.
Ramsaywack and Jones were among four prisoners who escaped from the Mazaruni Prison on February 16th. The other two: Kenrick Lyte and Samuel Gouveia remain on the lam.
Ramsaywack, of Berbice, was sentenced to death after being found guilty of the murder of a United States-based Buxton woman in 2015.
Ramsaywack was convicted of murdering Samantha Benjamin between March 25 and March 26, 2015.
Trial Judge Justice Sandil Kissoon at the time of sentencing had told the court that he found that the woman’s death was the result of a cold-blooded, calculated robbery that eventuated in murder.
In order to dispose of Benjamin’s body, Ramsaywack went to great lengths and effort to dismember her body. Her remains were found at the Annandale foreshore on March 26, 2015. Later the same day, her head, legs and arms were found at the foreshore.
Meanwhile, Jones, a resident of Bartica, was sentenced to 28 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to the unlawful killing of Timehri mechanic Puranand Baljit, who was stabbed to death during a robbery at his Madewini home in 2016.
In 2019, he appeared before Justice Kissoon at the High Court in Georgetown, where he pleaded guilty to manslaughter. He had initially been indicted for murdering Baljit, called ‘Andrew’, in the furtherance of a burglary on June 9, 2016.
His father, Ralph Jones, has been charged with four counts of being an accessory after the fact to escaping from lawful custody after allegedly admitting to providing assistance to the escapees, including a change of clothing after their escape.
