Derek Achong

A Cen­tral busi­ness­man has be­come the na­tion's sec­ond mur­der vic­tim since the end of the state of emer­gency last Mon­day.Joshua Hen­ry, 72, of Paria Av­enue, Lange Park, Ch­agua­nas, was killed dur­ing a rob­bery at his home on Sat­ur­day af­ter­noon.Po­lice said Hen­ry was beat­en to death by three un­masked ban­dits who stormed his home in search of cash and valu­ables.His killing has raised the mur­der toll for the year to 312.Ac­cord­ing to po­lice re­ports, at around 5.30 pm, Hen­ry, who op­er­at­ed a car rental com­pa­ny at his home, was sum­moned to his front gate by three men.Po­lice said the men then or­dered Hen­ry in­to the house where they tied him up, us­ing a bed­spread and oth­er pieces of fab­ric.

Four of Hen­ry's rel­a­tives who were al­so at home were tak­en in­to sep­a­rate bed­rooms where they were bound and gagged.Af­ter some time, Hen­ry's daugh­ter Coleen, man­aged to free her­self, af­ter which she freed her rel­a­tives.Po­lice said Hen­ry's life­less body was dis­cov­ered by his rel­a­tives in a room at the low­er lev­el of the house.In­ves­ti­ga­tors said Hen­ry was bound to a chair and bore marks of vi­o­lence to the face and up­per body.Po­lice said that Hen­ry was al­so found with a sheet tied tight­ly around his neck and might have been stran­gled by the men.Para­medics who re­spond­ed to the scene short­ly af­ter were un­able to re­vive Hen­ry. He was pro­nounced dead by a Dis­trict Med­ical Of­fi­cer (DMO) who vis­it­ed the scene.His body was tak­en to the Foren­sic Sci­ences Cen­tre, St James, where a post-mortem is ex­pect­ed to be con­duct­ed lat­er to­day.

In­ves­ti­ga­tors said they be­lieved that Hen­ry might have been tor­tured by the men to re­veal the lo­ca­tion of cash and valu­ables.Rel­a­tives told in­ves­ti­ga­tors that a tele­vi­sion, two com­put­ers, cell­phones, cash and jew­el­ry were miss­ing from the house.Po­lice said they be­lieved that the men fled the scene in a wait­ing ve­hi­cle.On Fri­day, the body of Lenny Slinger, 58, of Sa­hadeen Trace, Ve­ga de Oropouche, was found in a grav­el pit in San­gre Grande.Po­lice said they be­lieved Slinger, who was em­ployed as a watch­man, died af­ter be­ing hit on the head with a blunt ob­ject at a quar­ry site on Gor­don Trace, Tu­rure, San­gre Grande.The scene was vis­it­ed by Snr Supt Ed­ward Castil­lo, Supt John­ny Abra­ham, In­spec­tor Wayne Lawrence and of­fi­cers of the Ch­agua­nas CID and Task Force.Abra­ham is con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions.