Rad­hi­ca Sookraj

Gun­men fa­tal­ly shot a for­mer po­lice sergeant at White­land Heights, Mayo, yes­ter­day. Neigh­bours heard gun­shots and found Pe­ter Bruce, 65, of Hillview Dri­ve, Poona, slumped be­hind the wheel of his crashed Nis­san Cif­ero. Bruce, who re­tired from the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice in 2002, was last sta­tioned at the Siparia CID.

Po­lice said at around 12.30 am, Bruce was dri­ving along White­land Road. Near Par­adise Av­enue, the as­sailants opened fire from be­hind. Bul­lets smashed the rear wind­screen and right front win­dow of the car. Bruce was shot in the back of the head and neck. He ran off the road and crashed the car while the gun­men fled.

Bruce's daugh­ter, Camille, told the T&T Guardian she had no idea who would want to kill her fa­ther. "Every­body liked him and re­spect­ed him. We can't un­der­stand this. We do not know why this hap­pened. He had no en­e­mies as far as we know," she said.

His wife, Lynette Ran­some, said she last spoke to Bruce at about 6.30 pm on Sat­ur­day. She said Bruce ran the Triple M Recre­ation Club at White­land Junc­tion and was in the habit of re­turn­ing home in the ear­ly hours of the morn­ing. How­ev­er, on Sat­ur­day, Bruce locked up the bar ear­ly and went out.

"He came home, show­ered and then he left. He said he was go­ing down the road, but I don't know where he went," she said. Ran­some said some­one called at around 12.40 am and told her Bruce had been in­volved in an ac­ci­dent. She said when she went to the scene, she saw him ly­ing dead in the car.

She said she was con­fused by the killing be­cause there was no ev­i­dence to sug­gest it was a rob­bery. The body was tak­en to the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre in St James, where an au­top­sy will be con­duct­ed to­day. South­ern Di­vi­sion homi­cide of­fi­cers are con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions.