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Wednesday, July 16, 2025

6 people murdered in 24 hours

by

20140713

An­oth­er bloody week­end in T&T leaves six dead in 24 hours. Among them is a 13-year-old boy who was gunned down just out­side his home.Tragedy swept Trinidad's West, South and To­ba­go be­tween Fri­day and yes­ter­day, leav­ing fam­i­lies scram­bling to come to terms with the vi­o­lence that en­tered their homes. The mur­der toll for the year now stands at 237.The tragedy be­gan on Fri­day night when Day­ron Bak­er, 13, was killed mere me­tres from his Cizan Trace home in Diego Mar­tin.

The boy, a Stan­dard Five pupil at the Pat­na Riv­er Es­tate Pri­ma­ry School, left his home just be­fore 9 pm on Fri­day and was head­ed to his grand­moth­er's shop two hous­es away to buy two band-aids when gun­shots rang out.His dis­traught moth­er Na­tal­ie Bag­gan said even though she ran out and saw his bul­let-rid­dled body, she still could not be­lieve her son was dead."I hear the shots and bawl out his name be­cause I know he now leave, and the shots was so close, so loud," Bag­gan said.

Bak­er was the fourth of 14 chil­dren. When the Sun­day Guardian vis­it­ed the scene yes­ter­day, the small chil­dren seemed to un­der­stand their moth­er's grief.One girl, Bak­er's younger sis­ter, con­tin­u­al­ly stroked her moth­er's face, wip­ing away her tears."He was al­ways with me, al­ways with me. If I had to go any­where, he was al­ways com­ing with me," Bag­gan said.She said since the killing, she has had to walk back and forth along the same path where her son was mur­dered.

"When I run out last night and see his body, his blood was run­ning down the hill to­wards my foot," she re­called."I have to pass there...it still have blood there," she said.Bag­gan and hus­band Dex­ter Bak­er said Day­ron was nev­er in­volved in crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty, but they had a the­o­ry."I think they came for some­one else, and I think he saw who they were and they killed him to keep him qui­et," his fa­ther Bak­er said."The peo­ple had to know the area, they had to know where they were com­ing."

Dur­ing the short in­ter­view, Day­ron's old­er broth­er be­came vis­i­bly ag­i­tat­ed."The po­lice know who kill him, they know who kill my broth­er and they keep­ing qui­et," he said, walk­ing off in­to the house.West­ern Di­vi­sion Po­lice, led by Se­nior Su­per­in­ten­dent Ish­mael David, have not ruled out gang-re­lat­ed ac­tiv­i­ty.In a sub­se­quent in­ter­view with the Sun­day Guardian, David said po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tors had linked one of Day­ron's rel­a­tives to crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty.

"We do not be­lieve it was mis­tak­en iden­ti­ty, we be­lieve he was killed for his as­so­ci­a­tion," David said.Po­lice are con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions.Po­lice are al­so in­ves­ti­gat­ing the mur­der of a man in the Beetham. The man was not iden­ti­fied up to late yes­ter­day.The Sun­day Guardian un­der­stands that around 9.25 on Fri­day night, res­i­dents re­port­ed hear­ing loud ex­plo­sions near First Street. Mem­bers of the In­ter-Agency Task Force re­spond­ed and found a man, be­lieved to be in his 20s, with sev­er­al gun­shot wounds to his body.

The uniden­ti­fied man was pro­nounced dead on the scene.Mean­while, the may­hem con­tin­ued in South, where the moth­er of 32-year-old Corey Alexan­der vowed that her son's killers would be caught in three days.Some time be­tween 2 am and 6 am, in­trud­ers en­tered the down­stairs apart­ment of Alexan­der's Siparia home. His body bore mul­ti­ple chop wounds to the neck and chest. In­ves­ti­ga­tors be­lieve he was killed as he slept. His body, clad in un­der­wear, was found crouched at the base of his bed.

Over $50,000 worth of jew­el­ry, cloth­ing, and sneak­ers were miss­ing from the apart­ment.Moth­er Chris­tiana Alexan­der, 54, dropped to her knees and kissed the ground where the mur­der­ers walked, vow­ing that with­in three days they would be caught.Alexan­der's moth­er pushed aside the po­lice and prayed over the blood­ied corpse of her son, who was ex­pect­ed to be bap­tised to­day at the Cou­va Pen­te­costal Church.

Cur­tis, the mur­dered man's fa­ther, said he last spoke to his son around 10.30 pm. "I went to sleep af­ter he came home and when I woke up around 6 am, I saw his door open," Cur­tis re­called. He said he woke up his wife and around 7.30 am she went to check on Alexan­der."It was heart­break­ing be­cause he did not de­serve this. He was our on­ly child," Cur­tis said. Chris­tiana was in­con­solable as she raced around the house shout­ing prais­es to Je­sus and beg­ging God to catch the killers.

"Let this crime be solved. I'm giv­ing it three days. Thank you Je­sus for the po­lice and for send­ing ap­point­ed peo­ple. I for­give you mur­der­ers! Mur­der­ers, I for­give you!" she cried. Po­lice be­lieve the killers ran through the back of the house af­ter com­mit­ting the mur­der. A source said, two weeks ago Alexan­der re­ceived a death threat and re­port­ed it to the po­lice.

At an­oth­er mur­der scene at Sis­ters Road, Hard­bar­gain, rel­a­tives were mourn­ing the death of con­trac­tor Lisa Es­pinoza, 52, who was shot in the back while she and her hus­band Ramesh Ramdeo were pay­ing wages. Po­lice said the work­ers were stand­ing in a line wait­ing to be paid, when the rob­bers ap­proached and opened fire. They snatched $30,000 in cash and took off.

The cou­ple were sub-con­tract­ed at a con­struc­tion project off Rivulet Road, Cou­va. Se­nior of­fi­cers have since is­sued a warn­ing to busi­ness­peo­ple to stop pay­ing wages in cash.In a sep­a­rate in­ci­dent, Mar­vin Camp­bell, 40, of Sobo Vil­lage, La Brea, was al­so gunned down on Fri­day evening while he sat out­side Dream Girls Restau­rant and Bar at Ves­signy Vil­lage. Last night, two sus­pects aged 34 and 36, of Mor­vant and Nel­son Street, Port-of-Spain, were in po­lice cus­tody.

Camp­bell's fam­i­ly, who mi­grat­ed to New York, were ex­pect­ed to re­turn to Trinidad last night.Po­lice said Camp­bell was shot at around 6.15 pm. The killers sped off but po­lice set up a drag­net and in­ter­cept­ed the sus­pects at Dow Vil­lage, Oropouche. Po­lice found a 9 mm Glock pis­tol in the car. Au­top­sies are ex­pect­ed to be done on the bod­ies of Camp­bell, Alexan­der and Es­pinoza to­mor­row at the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre. In­ves­ti­ga­tions are con­tin­u­ing.

To­ba­go busi­ness­man killed

Mean­while, in To­ba­go, a brazen day­light shoot­ing in Scar­bor­ough, yes­ter­day, left busi­ness­man Nigel "Red Man" Fras­er, 43, of Sang­ster's Hill, dead.Ac­cord­ing to re­ports, the shoot­ing oc­curred short­ly af­ter 10 am at Fras­er's cloth­ing store, Red Man's Fash­ion, lo­cat­ed up­stairs the 7+7 Chi­nese Restau­rant on Wil­son Road.

The Sun­day Guardian un­der­stands that Fras­er was sit­ting in front of his es­tab­lish­ment when an un­masked man walked up to him and opened fire. He was shot in the ab­domen. He was rushed to the Scar­bor­ough Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal where he died while un­der­go­ing emer­gency surgery.Eye­wit­ness­es said the as­sailant es­caped in a gold Nis­san Almera, reg­is­tra­tion num­ber PCK 5539.

A po­lice source told the Sun­day Guardian that rob­bery may have been the mo­tive, since Fras­er's trade­mark gold chain with a pen­dant of the Coat of Arms of T&T val­ued at $300,000 was miss­ing.Po­lice have put out an all-points bul­letin for the gold Nis­san Almera. The oc­cu­pants are said to be armed and dan­ger­ous. Peo­ple with in­for­ma­tion are ad­vised to con­tact the near­est po­lice sta­tion. This brings To­ba­go's mur­der toll to 4 for 2014. The To­ba­go Homi­cide Bu­reau is in­ves­ti­gat­ing.


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