(Trinidad Express) Pleasantville taxi-driver Anthony Andrews was well loved by his family and the residents in his community in which he spent most of his life.
On Monday night, just less than two kilometres away from his home in Freedom Street, he fought gun-toting criminals who took his car and violently ended his life.
Andrews was shot after a struggle with the criminals on Parakeet Boulevard, and he died on the street.
His son, Peter Andrews, told reporters yesterday that his father was a church-going father of seven who was still paying for the vehicle that was stolen from him by his killers.
He said his father was employed as a security guard, but he moonlighted as a taxi-driver working the Pleasantville-to-San Fernando route.
“This is we hometown and this is the hard part. Everybody knows him here,” said Peter. “They killed him like a dog. But God does not sleep. My father liked to go to the gym, he checked with his friends, and played gospel music. Everybody knows he was looking for an honest dollar. He talked about retiring and fixing up his house.”
Residents in the community told the Express that Andrews was known as “a trusted taxi-driver, and a good person in the village”.
“People looked forward to travelling with him because he took his time on the roads and people knew it was safe to travel with him,” said a resident who did not wish to be identified.
On Monday night, a passenger in Andrews’ Suzuki Ciaz motor car told police that around 7.20 p.m., Andrews stopped on Ibis Lane to pick up two men who appeared to be in their early 20s.
Peter said he was told the two “passengers” initially requested to be taken to Orchid Gardens, but then they changed their destination to Parakeet Boulevard.
One of the men sat in the front passenger seat and the other in the rear seat behind Andrews.
The man in the rear seat pulled out a firearm and announced a robbery.
He took from the passenger a cellphone valued at $7,000; $3,000 and US$1,000 in cash.
The men forced Andrews to stop and ordered him and his passenger out of his vehicle.
Andrews struggled with the thieves and the gun-toting criminal opened fire on Andrews.
As Andrews fell to the ground, the criminals re-entered the vehicle and sped off.
Police were contacted and an all-points bulletin was issued for the vehicle.
Officers were tipped off by a resident that the vehicle was found abandoned about a kilometre away along Ladybird Crescent in Pleasantville.
The vehicle was taken by police to the Special Evidence Recovery Unit in Cumuto for fingerprinting and forensic testing.
‘He would take the chance to get that weapon away’
Peter said his father was a weightlifter and a boxer, and he had previously said that he would fight back if attacked by criminals.
“I told him if I reach a certain situation, I would give them the car. Why fight up? It’s just a machine. But he said, ‘Nah not me.’ He had the ‘old-school’ ways. He was a man who would take the chance to get that weapon away from them. There were no ifs, buts or maybe. He would take the chance,” said the grieving son.
“These youths do not know anything about work. They do not know about ‘eat little and live long’. They are looking for fast money. And when they get that two hundred or three hundred, what they going to do with that?” said the grieving son.
Peter still advised youths to seek “an honest dollar” and work for their money.
“I know things are hard, but to kill an honest person for nothing, you all put your life in jeopardy,” he said.