By Subhana Shiwmangal
The wife of Police Prosecutor Corporal Hemchand Sukhna is calling for justice with regard to the second attack on her husband by a person or persons carrying firearms last Saturday night.
According to Sukhna’s wife, Indranie Persaud, the second shooting has left her husband traumatized and scared for his life and his family’s.
The Guyana Police Force (GPF), she added, did not offer sympathy or any compassionate leave. He just went back to work. No one from the GPF has asked how her husband was coping mentally, physically and socially, she said.
“I’m asking for someone in high authority to look into my husband’s safety; to look into what is causing the attacks on him,” she stressed. She called for justice in the matter.
Persaud noted that prior to the first shooting at their home, Sukhna was stationed at the Diamond Magistrate’s Court. Following that incident, he was transferred to the Mahdia Magistrate’s Court. However in September last year, he was eventually transferred to the Sparendaam Magistrate’s Court. Since then, she said, he has been working as a normal officer in the Enquiry Office. She contended that he had not worked as a prosecutor since September last year and yet, he was attacked again.
Persaud opined that their next step was likely to seek a lawyer’s advice or to get out of the country because, “how much more will we endure?”
She related to Stabroek News that after the first shooting in 2021, they had faced the same treatment from the GPF. They were told that investigations were ongoing and after that received no other update on the matter. She said that her husband has been serving in the Guyana Police force for 22 years.
Persaud also suggested that it would be good if he could be transferred back to Diamond as the distance for him to get home from Sparendaam was tedious.
Meanwhile, Commander of Regional Division Four A, Assistant Commissioner Simon McBean told Stabroek News yesterday that no one has not been arrested over the shooting at Sukhna’s minibus as he drove along the Rupert Craig Highway. McBean confirmed that investigations are ongoing.
Information released by the police stated that 42-year-old Sukhna was on his way to work in his RZ minibus (PHH 6880) when he came under attack.
The police said that as Sukna turned onto the Rupert Craig Highway from the traffic light at Sheriff Street, he observed a dark-coloured Premio car drive up alongside him. When the vehicle got close to his minibus, he observed the driver and another man sitting in the car’s front passenger seat.
Sukhna told police that the driver started shouting and pointing at him but he could not decipher what was being uttered. The corporal said he continued driving, and at the traffic light at Rupert Craig and Conversation Tree, he heard a loud explosion. A bullet had struck the driver-side door of his minibus and shattered the window. The car then drove off at a fast speed, heading east on Rupert Craig Highway.
CID ranks processed the scene and a bullet was recovered from the door of the minibus, while a .9MM spent shell was found on the northern carriageway on the Rupert Craig Highway in the vicinity of Conversation Tree, police said.
In November 2021, gunmen had opened fire at the prosecutor’s home damaging the rear windshield of his minibus and leaving bullet holes in his house.
“Me, my wife and my nephew were sitting at the front of the house under the shed and then I heard some loud explosions. I didn’t respond to it right away but then I heard some more. When I heard the second amount now, I just told them [his wife and nephew] to drop on the ground, to make themselves the smaller target,” Sukhna recalled in a telephone interview in 2021.
Police had found several spent shells at that scene and investigators believed that incident might have been linked to a court case Sukhna prosecuted.
Asked whether he had any idea why he might be targeted, Sukhna drew the same conclusion. He recalled being threatened by the accused during a particular trial, but said he did not take it seriously at the time. He said that person was recently released from prison after serving a three-year sentence.
He also recalled being attacked about eight years ago, while returning home from work. “At the time I was stationed at Brickdam Police Station… I used to take public transportation to work… I was beaten and robbed,” he said.
Sukhna said while he was fearful for his life and the lives of his family members, he had to continue performing his duties.
