Gail Alexan­der

"I love you... how could you leave so soon..."So­ca star Machel Mon­tano shed his show­biz clothes, tamed his locks up and donned a black suit to croon that good­bye melody to slain se­nior coun­sel Dana See­ta­hal at yes­ter­day's fu­ner­al ser­vice.Mon­tano's ap­pear­ance, ac­com­pa­ny­ing him­self on key­board, high­light­ed the two-hour plus fu­ner­al ser­vice at Ara­malaya Pres­by­ter­ian Church, Tu­na­puna.The church was packed to over­flow­ing with dig­ni­taries for the 5 pm fu­ner­al. Crowds al­so gath­ered in tents out­side the church and on the road.Mon­tano, who was See­ta­hal's client, had been among those who rushed to the scene of the crime last Sun­day af­ter See­ta­hal was as­sas­si­nat­ed in Wood­brook just af­ter mid­night.At yes­ter­day's ser­vice, Mon­tano, wear­ing dark shades, told the con­gre­ga­tion he met See­ta­hal sev­er­al years ago and they had formed a "fam­i­ly" in which she had been the ma­tri­arch.

He said af­ter the mur­der he asked his at­tor­ney Kei­th Scot­land, an­oth­er of her col­leagues, "who will take care of us now?"Mon­tano, who sang the tune emo­tion­al­ly and soul­ful­ly, said he had com­posed and adapt­ed it for the fu­ner­al.There was ap­plause not on­ly for that ren­di­tion but al­so for some of the trib­utes paid to See­ta­hal, par­tic­u­lar­ly by her young nieces and nephews.Her nephew, De­vanan Per­sad, won a strong mur­mur of agree­ment from the con­gre­ga­tion when he said: "There has nev­er been and nev­er will be a cal­i­bre of bul­let or am­mu­ni­tion to ex­tin­guish my aunt in any way."You can't kill an idea with a bul­let, it's im­pos­si­ble and aun­ty Dana was an idea."

Per­sad added: "She lives in your con­scious­ness. This is just the body, bul­let can't do that (kill an idea)."Per­sad said the He­brew mean­ing of See­ta­hal's first name was "God is My Judge". He added: "So her name will live on..."Oth­er nephews and nieces–An­tal Teemul, Sathyam See­ta­hal, Melis­sa Per­sad, Lendl Per­sad and Phillipe Fran­cois – de­scribed See­ta­hal as a great aunt, a role mod­el and "a su­per­woman."They re­mem­bered her as a lover of fam­i­ly gath­er­ings and or­gan­is­er of Christ­mas din­ners, an ace scrab­ble and chess play­er.At least two, in­clud­ing her nephew who lived with her at one time when he at­tend­ed UWI, strug­gled with emo­tions but re­mained calm.An­oth­er niece, Dr Ja­nine See­ta­hal, who did a scrip­ture read­ing, end­ed with a break­ing voice.See­ta­hal's niece, Lean­na, who prac­tised law at See­ta­hal's cham­bers, said: "I wish you peace aun­ty..."An­oth­er niece, Danielle Fran­cois, sat in the front pew, solemn­ly hug­ging a large ted­dy bear.

Sib­lings strug­gle­with emo­tion

See­ta­hal's sis­ter, Su­san Fran­cois, who de­liv­ered the eu­lo­gy, read a trib­ute to See­ta­hal sent by her col­league of many years, for­mer DPP Ge­of­frey Hen­der­son, who is now a judge at the In­ter­na­tion­al Crim­i­nal Court in the Hague.Fran­cois said Hen­der­son was ex­treme­ly close to See­ta­hal and had sent the trib­ute, en­ti­tled "A Na­tion­al Trea­sure".Hen­der­son, in the trib­ute read by Fran­cois, stat­ed that See­ta­hal had a deep love of T&T and a huge de­sire to give back to T&T and make it a bet­ter place."She loved pub­lic ser­vice," Hen­der­son stat­ed.He said See­ta­hal had done a lot of work for the DPP's of­fice at pep­per­corn rates and had men­tored lawyers, young and old­er, and shared her ex­pe­ri­ence freely."We mar­velled at her tremen­dous work eth­ic... she was for­mi­da­ble in court," he said.Hen­der­son said when See­ta­hal took "silk", as­sumed the sta­tus of se­nior coun­sel, none ques­tioned the de­ci­sion and many thought it should have been giv­en soon­er.

"Dana's silk was true silk," Hen­der­son not­ed.His trib­ute not­ed See­ta­hal was al­so a good re­source to the Cari­com crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem.Hen­der­son said See­ta­hal had loved writ­ing the news­pa­per columns she did and gave care­ful thought to each and their se­lec­tion, clar­i­fy­ing com­plex is­sues and those which were ob­fus­cat­ed by oth­ers.He said her nick­name was "Seets" and though some­time rough, she didn't have a bad bone in her body."She was hon­est, loy­al, fair and fear­lesss. Her mur­der by gut­less cow­ards has left a deep void," Hen­der­son said, adding See­ta­hal's par­ents had giv­en T&T a na­tion­al trea­sure.Fran­cois, af­ter con­clud­ing Hen­der­son's trib­ute, said up to last Sun­day morn­ing she had five sis­ters, "Now I have four."Say­ing See­ta­hal was the fam­i­ly's guid­ing light, Fran­cois added: "I can speak words of the loss and dev­as­ta­tion we feel but they would be woe­ful­ly in­ad­e­quate."We will shed tears that she has gone, but we will smile be­cause she has lived. We will open our eyes and see all she has left and we will cher­ish her mem­o­ry and let it live on."

Fran­cois, though look­ing strained, main­tained her com­po­sure through the de­liv­ery.But when Fran­cois con­clud­ed her con­tri­bu­tion in a slight­ly shaky voice, "Go with God, my sis­ter ...," her be­spec­ta­cled broth­er in the pew be­hind hers, broke down and held his head in his hands.See­ta­hal's law school mate, Mer­lin Boyce, elicit­ed smiles when she re­lat­ed how See­ta­hal en­joyed fa­cials, de­sign­er clothes and hair styling.Boyce spoke about how both might have end­ed up at the Red House on Ju­ly 27, 1990 to see for­mer school­mate Joseph Toney, but See­ta­hal had said the Par­lia­ment was "too bor­ing..."Rev Daniel Teelucks­ingh, de­liv­er­ing a stir­ring ser­mon, elicit­ed nods in­clud­ing from the Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie when he said: "T&T is no easy place to gov­ern."Al­so on the pro­gramme were prayers by RC priest Fr Clyde Har­vey and Pun­dit Rhandir Ma­haraj.At­ten­dees com­prised a who's who of the le­gal, po­lit­i­cal and law en­force­ment hi­er­ar­chy.Among the PP and PNM lead­ers were Sen­ate Pres­i­dent Tim­o­thy Hamel-Smith, for­mer pres­i­dent George Maxwell Richards, For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter (Tu­na­puna MP) Win­ston Dook­er­an, Plan­ning Min­is­ter Bhoe Tewarie, Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Gary Grif­fith, act­ing Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Stephen Williams, PCA head Gillian Lucky, UWI prin­ci­pal Clem Sankat, Jus­tice Vashist Kokaram, at­tor­ney Mar­tin Daly, PNM's Dr Kei­th Row­ley, Amery Browne, Nafeesa Mo­hammed and oth­ers.